The doctrine of the two covenants, wherein the nature of original sin is explained and St. Paul and St. James reconciled in the great article of justification

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THE

DOCTRINE

THE TWO COVENANTS

THE NATURE OF ORIGINAL SIN IS EXPLAINED ; AND

ST. PAUL AND ST. JAMES RECONCILED IN THE

GREAT ARTICLE OF JUSTIFICATION.

BY EZEKIEL HOPKINS, D.D.

BISHOP OF LONDONDERRY.
BORN 1633, DIED 1690.

LONDON :

RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY,

Imtituted 1799.

SOLD AT THE DEPOSITORY, 56, PATERNOSTER ROW J
AND BY THE BOOKSELLERS.

Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2008 with funding from

Microsoft Corporation

http://www.archive.org/details/doctrineoftwocovOOhopkuoft

THE DOCTRINE

OP

THE TWO COVENANTS.

" For Moses describeth the righteousness which is
of the law, That the man, which doeth those
things, shall Hoe by them. But the righteous-
ness which is of faith speaketh on this ivise,
Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into
heaven ? (that is, to bring Christ down from
above;) or, Who shall descend into the deep?
(that is, to bring up Christ again from the
dead.) But what saith it ? The word is nigh
thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that
is, the word of faith, which we preach; that if
thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord
Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God
hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be
saved," Rom. x. 5 — 9.

INTRODUCTION.

Of all the mysterious depths in the christian religion,
there is none more necessary for our information,
nor more influential upon our practice, than a right
apprehension, and a distinct knowledge, of the
Doctrine of the Covenants ; for, if we be ignorant
or mistaken in this, we must needs be liable to false
or confused notions of the law and the gospel ; of our
fall in Adam, and restoration by Christ ; of the true
grounds of men's condemnation, and the means
and terms of their justification ; of the justice of
God in punishing sinners, and his glorious mercy
in saving believers : and, consequently, neither can

4 INTRODUCTION.

many perplexing doubts and questions be resolved,
the necessity, and yet different concurrence of faith
and obedience unto salvation cleared, the utter
insufficiency of our own righteousness to procure
acceptance for us with God, evinced, his justice
vindicated, nor his grace glorified. For all these
great and important truths will readily own them-
selves to be built upon the foundation of God's
covenant and stipulation with man ; as I hope to
make appear in our farther progress.

And yet, though this doctrine be thus generally
serviceable both to knowledge and practice, how
many are there who call themselves christians, that
are grossly ignorant of these transactions between
God and man ! that know not upon what terms
they stand with the Almighty ; nor what they may
expect, according to the tenor of their mutual
compact and agreement !

This, therefore, I shall endeavour to treat of, as
briefly and as clearly as the subject will permit,
from the words which I have now read unto you ;
which are the transcript and copy of those two
great contracts made between heaven and earth,
God and man : the one, from the beginning of his
being, and that is the Covenant of Works ; the
other, immediately upon his fall and ruin, and that
is the Covenant of Grace : the one, called here the
Righteousness of the Law ; and the other, the
Righteousness of Faith.

But, before I can particularly treat on this sub-
ject, I must first show you what a Covenant is, in
its general notion ; and whether there is, or can be
any such thing as a proper covenant between God
and man.

Our English word covenant seems to be borrowed
from the Latin convenire or conventus, which sig-

INTRODUCTION. 5

nifies a mutual agreement and accord, upon condi-
tions propounded, and accepted by the parties
concerned. And it may be thus described- — A
covenant is a mutual consent and agreement
entered into between persons, whereby they stand
bound, each to other, to perform the conditions
contracted and indented for. And thus a covenant
is the very same thing with a contract or bargain.

Now, to a strict and proper covenant there are
two things presupposed.

First. That, in the persons contracting, there be
a natural liberty and freedom the one from the
other ; that is, that the one be not bound to the
other as to the things covenanted for, ante-
cedently to that compact or agreement made
between them.

For where an obligation to a duty is natural,
there it cannot be strictly and properly federal, or
arising from a covenant. If children should indent
with their parents to yield them obedience, upon
condition that they on their part will, afford them
fit and convenient provision, this cannot, in strict
sense, be called a covenant ; because neither of the
parties were free from the obligation of a natural
law, which obliged them antecedently to this com-
pact. In a proper covenant, the things promised
by each party must be due, only upon consent and
agreement : so that there must be an equality of
the persons covenanting, if not in other respects,
yet in respect of that for which they do covenant,
that the right of both, in what they mutually pro-
mise, be equal. If one man covenant with another
to serve him faithfully, upon condition of such a
reward and wages, though there may be much dis-
parity upon other accounts between them, yet, as
to the things covenanted for, there is none ; the
A2

6 INTRODUCTION.

one having as much right to the wages as the other
to the service, and neither having right to either
before the agreement.

Second. In a proper covenant, there must be
mutual consent of the persons covenanting.

And this is called a stipulation, whereby each
party doth freely and voluntarily engage himself to
the other for his own particular benefit and advan-
tage. For where both are free, and disobliged, it
is generally the apprehension of some good that
will accrue unto them, that brings them to enter
into a federal engagement.

Now, this being plainly the nature of a covenant^
it clearly follows, that there neither is, nor can be
a strict and proper covenant between God and
man. For,

First. Both parties covenanting are not naturally
free the one from the other.

God is, indeed, naturally and originally free, and
hath no obligation to man antecedent to his own
gracious will and promise. But man hath a double
bond to duty ; both his natural obligation, as he is
a creature, and his federal, as he is a covenanter ;
and therefore he is bound to obedience, not only
by his stipulation and engagement, but also upon
that natural relation wherein he stands to God as
his Creator, and which alone would have been a
sufficient obligation upon him, had he never entered
into covenant. And,

Second. The creature's consent and agree-
ment is not necessary to the covenant which God
makes with it.

And that, because the terms of it being so infi-
nitely to our advantage, as there can be no reason
imagined why we should dissent, so, neither is
there any to expect an explicit consent for the

INTRODUCTION. 7

ratification of it. Neither are we lords of ourselves ;
but he who made us may impose on us what laws
he pleaseth ; and, if he condescend to encourage
us by promises of reward, this voluntary obligation,
which God is pleased to lay upon himself, lays a
farther obligation upon us to do what he requires,
out of love and thankfulness, faith and hope,
whereby we cheerfully expect and embrace what
he hath promised; which likewise, of itself, is so
vastly transcendent and disproportionate to all our
performances, that it cannot be our due, upon a
strict and proper covenant, (for, in every such bar-
gain, that which is promised by both parties must
be alike valuable, at least in the esteem of the
covenanters,) but rather a free beneficence, upon
an arbitrary promise.

So that, between man and man, a covenant is a
mutual and an equal obligation ; but, between God
and man, it is only a mutual obligation ; on God's
part, to a free performance of his promises, and on
man's pari, to a cheerful performance of his duty :
wherein, as there is no equality, either in right or
value, so, neither is there any necessity that man
should give an explicit and formal, consent
thereto.

And, as God's transactions with us are not
strictly and properly a covenant, so, neither are
they strictly and properly a law ; although they are
often called the law of works, and the law of faith.
For God doth not deal with us merely out of abso-
lute sovereignty, but he is graciously pleased to
oblige himself to us by promise ; which doth not
belong to a sovereign, acting as such, but carries
some resemblance of a covenant. So that the
agreement which God hath made with man, is not
merely a covenant, nor merely a law, but mixed

8 INTRODUCTION.

of both. If God had only said " Do this," without
adding " Thou shalt live," this had not been a
covenant, but a law; and, if he had only said
"Thou shalt live," without commanding " Do this,"
it had not been a covenant, but a promise. Remove
the condition, and you make it a simple promise;
remove the promise, and you make it an absolute
law : but, both these being found in it, it is both a
law and a covenant, though both in a large accep-
tation.

And thus you see what a covenant is, and how
the transactions between God and man may be
said to be a covenant, and wherein they differ from
the proper notion of one.

Yet the difference is not so great, but that the
scripture most frequently makes mention of cove-
nants ratified between God and man, and chiefly
insists upon the two principal ones, which indeed
are the argument and substance,of the whole bible,
the covenant of works, and the covenant of grace ;
in which not only particular persons were engaged,
but the whole race of mankind ; the summary con-
tents of which were, " Do this, and live," and
" Believe, and live." The former is the tenor of
the covenant of works, the latter the tenor of the
covenant of grace. And both these are expressed
in my text : the covenant of works is called the
righteousness of the law, that is, the rule of righte-
ousness by the law, the sentence of which is, that
" the man which doeth those things shall live by
them :" the covenant of grace is called " the righte-
ousness which is of faith," that is, the rule of obtain-
ing righteousness by faith, the purport of which is
this, that, if thou shalt believe on the Lord Jesus,
whom God hath raised from the dead, thou shalt be
saved.

PRELIMINARY REMARKS ON LAW AND
RIGHTEOUSNESS.

Now, here, before I can treat of the substance of
these two Covenants, it will be requisite to explain
to you —

What is meant by the law ; and,

What by righteousness.

I. To the first I answer, that the law is taken
very variously in scripture ; but, most commonly,
by it is meant the whole sum of those commands
which Moses, from the mouth of God, delivered to
the Israelites, containing that which we commonly
call the moral, judicial, and ceremonial law.

But, certainly, in this place it cannot be taken
in that latitude ; for the judicial and ceremonial
law were not branches of that covenant of works
which God entered into with Adam, nor are any
guilty for not observing them, except the Jews, to
whom they were particularly delivered.

This law, therefore, which, according to the
covenant of works, must be punctually fulfilled, in
order to our obtaining justification by it, is the
moral law ; the law and dictates of pure and uncor-
rupted nature. And this law of nature is no other
but a bright and shining impression of Divine light
upon the soul ; a kind of parely* and reflection of
the immutable, unsearchable, and eternal law of
God's holiness ; a communication of Divine attri-
butes unto us, whereby, in our first moulding, we
were stamped after the similitude of God, and are
said to bear his image.

* Or Parhelion, a solar refraction, or reflection of the

10 THE DOCTRINE OF

Of this moral law, God hath given the world two
draughts ; the one archetypal, being the fair stric-
tures of his own likeness, in our first creation ; the
other ectypal,* in the decalogue, wherein he hath
in ten words limned out what man's nature was
when it was perfect, and what it ought to be that
it may be perfect. So that, for the matter and
substance of them, there is no difference at all
between the original law of man's first creation, the
law of pure reason and uncorrupted nature, and
the transcript thereof in the moral law delivered
by Moses.

And, therefore, as the law of his creation was to
Adam a covenant of works, so the moral law, being
for the matter of it the very same, must also be
acknowledged to be the matter and substance of
the covenant of works. The same commands of
both tables, which bind us to obedience, bound
Adam himself, so far forth as his condition in para-
dise was capable of an actual obligation by them ;
for parents, he had none to honour ; neighbours
and servants, he had none to receive the offices of
justice and charity. But, had he continued in his
first estate till these relations had sprung up about
him, the same commands, from the innate principle
of his reason, would have bound him to his respect-
ive duties towards them as do now bind us.

And this may be farther discerned, even by
those obscure prints of the law of nature which yet
remain upon the hearts of heathens, who, though
they have not the law, yet, saith the apostle, they
" do by nature the things contained in the law,"
that is, in the moral law, Rom. ii. 14. As, when
Moses brake the two tables of stone, yet something

* Ectype, an impression, or copy.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 11

of the commandments was still left engraven by the
finger of God upon the shattered pieces of them ;
so, when man fell, and brake that goodly frame of
his nature, yet, still some remains and parcels of
the same law, written there likewise by the finger
of God, may be observed still to continue upon it.

So that, between the law of pure nature and the
moral law, there is as much agreement as between
an indenture and its counterpart. And, therefore,
if the law of nature were to Adam a covenant of
works, as doubtless it was, the moral law, being for
the matter of it the same, must likewise for the
matter of it be the same covenant.

Now, the moral law may be considered by us
either as a covenant of works, or as a rule of life.
In the former respect, it is superseded to all be-
lievers by the mercy and grace of the gospel ; in
the latter, it is explained, corroborated, and pro-
tected by the gospel ; and, though it be no longer
the measure of God's proceedings towards us, yet
still it is the measure of our duty towards him.

And here, if a profitable digression may be
allowed, give me leave to show you the agreement
and difference that there is between the law and
the gospel. For, since they are vulgarly thought
such opposite things, it will not, perhaps, be im-
pertinent to state and fix the limits, both of their
opposition and concord.

When we speak of the law and the gospel, the
words are very equivocal, and may cause many
mistakes and errors in ignorant and confused
minds. For,

1. By the law, three things may be under-
stood.

(1.) The law, as a covenant of works.

And then, as hath been already noted, it must

12 THE DOCTRINE OF

be taken for the sum and substance of the moral
law, as originally imprinted in our natures.

(2.) By law, may be meant the moral law, as it
is the rule for our duty and obedience.

And so we understand it, when we commonly
say, the law commands this or that to be done, or
this and that to be avoided.

(3.) By the law, may be meant legal administra-
tions and ceremonies, which, under the pedagogy*
of Moses, were a great part of the Jewish worship.

And thus we call their sacrifices, purifyings,
ways of atonement, and other typical rites, legal
observances.

2. So, likewise, when we speak of the gospel,
two things may be meant by it.

(1.) Gospel grace, purchased for lost mankind
by Jesus Christ : both relative grace, for the change
of our state, in pardon, justification, adoption, &c.
and real grace, for the change of our natures, in
sanctification and renovation.

And thus we use to say, that the first gospel
that ever was preached in the world, was to Adam,
presently after his fall, by God himself, Gen. iii. 15.
The Seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's
head : for this was the first discovery of grace and
mercy, through Christ Jesus. Yea, and the
promise made to Abraham many ages before the
coming of Christ into the world, is by the apostle
called the preaching of the gospel : "God,"saith the
apostle, " preached before the gospel unto Abra-
ham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed,"
Gal. iii. 8.

(2.) By gospel, is sometimes meant the gospel
administration of this grace, dispensed to the world
by Christ himself and his ministers, in a more free
Teaching.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 13

and open way, than the -shadows under the law
did exhibit.

3. Now, according to these various accepta-
tions of law and gospel, we may observe a twofold
difference and a twofold agreement between them.

Their difference is twofold.

If we understand by the law a covenant of
works, and by the gospel the grace and mercy of
the gospel; so, they are extremely opposite and
contrary one to the other.

For, take gospel grace for relative grace, such
as whereby we are pardoned, reconciled, justified,
and adopted; these could have no place at all
under the covenant of works. Yea, if we take
gospel grace for the real grace of sanctification
and renovation, so as these terms do imply the
making of an unclean thing holy, and an old thing
new ; it had not, neither could have place under
the covenant of works, because there was no un-
cleanness supposed to be done away, nor any thing
old that should be renewed. For this covenant
makes no allowances for transgression, nor any ad-
mission of repentance. Yet, indeed, the habits of
grace, which now sanctify us, were also in Adam,
whilst under this covenant : yea, and Christ also
was the author of them ; but with this difference,
that to him Christ was the author of them merely
as Creator, but to us as Redeemer ; to him, only as
God Che second Person, but to us as God-man the
Mediator.

If, by the law, we mean a legal administra-
tion under types and figures, such as were the sa-
crifices and ceremonies in use under the Jewish
discipline ; and, by the gospel, that clear and un-
veiled way of dispensing the means of salvation
since the coming of Christ into the world : so,

B

14 THE DOCTRINE OF '

again, they as much differ each from other, as
shadows do from substance, or clouds from sun-
shine.

And thus may we understand that antithesis,
" The law was given by Moses ;" that is, the cere-
monial, shady law: " but grace and truth came by
Jesus Christ," Johni. 17 ; that is, a clearer and more
full manifestation of grace, and the very substance
and truth of those things which were before typi-
fied and adumbrated.

These are the two differences between the law
and the gospel ; in both which, the gospel takes
place upon the abrogation of the law : gospel grace
hath abrogated the law as a covenant ; and gospel
dispensations have abrogated legal ceremonies.

Their agreement is, likewise, twofold.

[1.] If we take the moral law as it is the direct-
ive rule of our obedience, so there is a perfect
harmony and accord between it and the gospel.

For the duties of the moral law are as strictly
required from believers since Christ's coming, as
they were before : yea, as strictly as ever they were
from Adam in innocence; though not upon the
same terms from us, as from him. The gospel is,
in this respect, so far from weakening the law, that
it doth rather much strengthen and confirm it.
What saith our Saviour? I am not " come to de-
stroy the law, but to fulfil" it, Matt. v. 17 : And
the apostle? " Do we then make void the law
through faith ? God forbid : yea, we establish the
law," Rom. iii. 31. The gospel receives the law
into its protection and patronage : so that, to the
obliging power, which it had before from the
authority of God the great Sovereign of the world,
enacting it; hereby is added the farther sanction of
Christ the Mediator, ratifying and confirming it ;

THE TWO COVENANTS. 15

who likewise gives us of his Spirit, whereby we are
enabled to act in conformity to the law, and to
fulfil its commands. The law is, therefore, now
taken within the pale of the gospel, and in-
corporated into it: so that it is no longer law
and gospel ; but, rather, an evangelical and gospel
law.

[2.] If, by law, we mean the legal administra-
tions of ceremonies and sacrifices, types and figures,
used under the Mosaical discipline ; and if, by
gospel, we mean the grace exhibited by it of
pardon, justification, &c. so neither is there any
opposition or repugnance between them, but a
most perfect accord and agreement.

For, before Christ's coming into the world,
gospel grace was under a legal administration.
When the sun is approaching us in the morning,
though its body be under the horizon, and in
another hemisphere, yet then we see the dawning
and glimmering of its light. So was it in the
church : though the Sun of righteousness was not
risen upon them with its full brightness, yet they
then saw and enjoyed the dawn of our perfect day ;
and those Jews, who lived as it were in the other
hemisphere of time before Christ's coming, were as
much under grace as now we are, though not
under such clear and glorious dispensations of it.
We read, indeed, that the disciples were first called
christians some few years after our Saviour's death ;
but yet those saints, who lived many ages before
his birth, were as truly christians as they, though
not known nor distinguished by that name. Yea,
and I remember I have somewhere met with a
passage of St. Ambrose :* Prius ccepisse populam
ch?'istianumf qudm populum Judaorum : " There
* Pe Sacram. 1. iv. c. 3.

16 THE DOCTRINE OF*

were christian people in the world, before ever
there was a Jewish nation." They had then the
same Christ to save them, the same promises to
support them, the same faith to appropriate both
unto them, as now we have. They were under as
great an impossibility of obtaining life by the deeds
of the law, as we are ; and we under as strict an
injunction to fulfil the commands of the law, as
was ever imposed on them. The only difference
between them and us consists in this, that they
saw the Sun of righteousness under a cloud ; we,
openly : they, by its reflection ; we, directly.

And, thus much for the opening of what is
meant by the law, in this text ; which is the moral
law, as a covenant of works.

II. The second preliminary was, to explain
what was meant by righteousness. " Moses
describeth the righteousness which is of the law,"
&c.

And, indeed, unless we have a clear notion of
this, we can neither know for what ends the cove-
nants were made, nor wherein the nature of justi-
fication doth consist : for, because we fulfil the
covenant made with us by God, therefore are we
righteous ; and because we are righteous according
to the terms of the covenant, therefore are we jus-
tified. So that a clear knowledge of this righteous-
ness will be serviceable to the unfolding of both ;
since it is the end of the covenant, and the matter
of justification.

This, therefore, I shall attempt, by giving, first,
several distinctions ; and, then, several theses or
positions, concerning righteousness.

There is, therefore, a twofold righteousness.

Qualitative ; or that which may be understood
as a quality or habit in us.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 17

Relative or legal ; or that, which stands in con-
formity to some law.

A qualitative righteousness is nothing else but
the divine qualities of grace and holiness inherent
in the soul.

Holiness and righteousness, to be gracious and
to be righteous, in this sense signify one and the
same thing.

Nothing doth more frequently occur in scripture,
than this use of the word. So, Noah is called
righteous, Gen. vii. 1. and Abraham pleads with
God for the righteous in Sodom, Gen. xviii. 23, 24.
and Zacharias and Elizabeth have this testimony,
that they were both righteous, because they walked
in all the commandments of the Lord blameless,
Luke i. 6. The ways of holiness are called the
ways of righteousness, Ps. xxiii. 3 ; and the works
of holiness, works of righteousness, Ps. xv. 2.
Isa. lxiv. 5, and " He that doeth righteousness, is
righteous," 1 John iii. 7. Many other places there
are, too numerous to be cited, wherein righteous-
ness is taken both for the inherent principle of
holiness, and for the gracious actions that proceed
therefrom.

It is, indeed, improper to call our holiness,
which is so imperfect and full of failings, by
the name of righteousness. Nay, were it most
perfect and consummate, yet it is not the same
with righteousness strictly and properly taken ; for
righteousness, properly, is rather a denomination
arising from the conformity of actions to their
rule, than either the principle or substance of the
actions themselves: for that is righteous, which is
right; and that is right, which is agreeable to the
rule by which it is to be measured. Even in.
Adam, whose holiness was perfect, yet was there
b2

18 THE DOCTRINE OF

this difference between it and his righteousness, at
least in our clear conceptions — that his grace, as it
was conformable to its pattern, namely, the purity
of God, so it was his holiness ; but as it stood m
conformity to the law of God, so it was his righte-
ousness. For, in strict propriety of speech, the
rule of holiness is different from the rule of righte-
ousness : holiness is measured by similitude to
God ; righteousness, by conformity to the law ;
holiness may admit of degrees, and be more or
less perfect in several subjects in whom it is im-
planted ; but righteousness consists in an indi-
visible and unvariable point, for if it be less than
a perfect conformity, it is not righteousness, and
more than perfect it cannot be.

Yet our defective and imperfect holiness may
obtain the name of righteousness : either because
it flows from that principle, which, in its own
nature, tends to a perfect conformity unto the
law ; or, else, because it is a necessary and inse-
parable concomitant of a true and proper righte-
ousness, though not our own, yet imputed.

There is a legal or relative righteousness ;
and this a man is said to have, when the law, by
which he is to be judged, hath nothing whereof to
accuse him.

Unto this righteousness there are required,

1 . A law established for the regulating of our
actions.

For as, where there is no law, there can be no
transgression ; so, neither can there be any proper
positive righteousness. And,

2. There must be a perfect conformity unto
this law.

The law is the straight rule, by which all our
actions are to be measured : I mean the law of

TIFE TWO COVENANTS. 19

nature and right reason, enacted to all mankind;
and the superadded law of Divine revelation, to
those who enjoy it. Now, it is a contradiction, to
affirm that there can be a righteousness, where
there is any obliquity in actions, compared to the
rule and law whereby they must be judged; for,
in case of such obliquity and crookedness, the law
hath an advantage to lay in an accusation against
the transgressor.

So, then, we may take a brief description of
righteousness, properly so called, in these terms :
righteousness is a denomination, first of actions,
and consequently of persons, arising from their
perfect conformity to the law whereby they must
be judged. It must be first of actions, and then
of the person; because the righteousness of the
person results from the conformity of his actions.
Nor will it suffice that some of his actions be thus
conformable to the law, but every action that falls
under its cognizance must be conformed unto it,
or else the person can by no means be accounted
righteous.

This perfect conformity being thus absolutely
necessary to constitute a person righteous, and yet
as absolutely impossible to us in this our lapsed
state, it might therefore seem to be alike impos-
sible that ever we should obtain a righteousness
that might avail to our justification.

And, therefore, for the clearer apprehension
of the nature of righteousness, and the manner
how we are denominated righteous, which indeed
is the very critical point in the doctrine of justifi-
cation, these following distinctions, if duly pon-
dered, will be very serviceable.

The law consists of two parts. I. The pre-
cept, requiring obedience : " Do this." 2. The

20 THE DOCTRINE OF

sanction of this precept by rewards and punish-
ments : " The man, that doeth these things, shall
live by them," is the reward promised unto
obedience ; and, " The soul, that sinneth, it shall
die," is the punishment threatened against dis-
obedience.

Now, according to these two parts of the law, so
there are two ways of becoming righteous by the
law ; so that it shall have nothing to lay to our
charge. The one is, by obedience to the precept;
the other is, by submission to the penalty : not
only he who performs what the law commands, is
thereby righteous; but he also who hath suffered
what the law threatens.

From hence we may again distinguish righte-
ousness, into a righteousness of obedience, and a
righteousness of satisfaction : the former ariseth
from performing the precept of the law; the latter,
from undergoing the penalty. Between these two
righteousnesses this remarkable difference may be
observed, that the promise of life being annexed
to the fulfilling of the precept, the righteousness
of obedience gives a full right and title unto the
life promised : but no such right results from the
righteousness of satisfaction ; for it is not said in
the law, " Suffer this, and live," since the suffering
itself was death, but " Do this, and live." So that,
by mere satisfaction, a man is not accounted the
fulfiller of the law ; nor yet farther, to be dealt
withal, as a transgressor of it. Hence, then, the
one may be called a positive righteousness, be-
cause it ariseth from actual and positive confor-
mity of our obedience to the rules of the law : the
other, only negative righteousness, because satis-
faction is equivalent to innocency, and reduceth

THE TWO COVENANTS. 21

the person to a guiltless condition ; which I here
call a negative righteousness.

Now each of these, both the righteousness of
obedience and that of satisfaction, may again be
twofold ; either personal, or imputed. I call that
personal righteousness, which a man in his own
person works out, whether it be of obedience to
the commands of the law, or of satisfaction to the
penalty thereof. Imputed righteousness is a righ-
teousness wrought out by another, yet graciously,
by the Lawgiver himself, made ours ; and so ac-
counted as effectual to all intents of the law, as if
we had in our own persons performed it.

These distinctions being thus premised, I shall
now proceed to lay down some positions, which
may farther clear up this subject to our appre-
hensions.

1. If we could perfectly fulfil the preceptive
part of the law, we should thereby obtain a perfect
righteousness of obedience ; and might lay claim
to eternal life, by virtue of the promise annexed to
the covenant of works.

This is most unquestionably true ; especially if
we suppose this perfect obedience by our own na-
tural strength, without the assistance of Divine and
supernatural grace : because such an ability would
infer the primitive integrity of our nature, and ex-
clude the guilt of original sin, which hath involved
all in the curse and malediction of the law.

2. If we could undergo the whole of thai pu-
nishment which the law threatens for disobedience,
then also should we be accounted personally righ-
teous by a righteousness of satisfaction.

If an offender against a human law suffers the
penalty which the law requires to be inflicted on

22 THE DOCTRINE OF

him, according to the nature of his offence, whe-
ther it be imprisonment, a pecuniary mulct, or the
like, that man thereby becomes negatively righte-
ous, because the law is satisfied, so that it hath
nothing farther to charge against him for that par-
ticular fact. Thus stands the case in reference to
the law of God. The transgressing of the command
binds us over to suffer punishment; which suffer-
ing, if we can accomplish, and come from under,
we shall be as righteous in the sight of God, as if
we had never transgressed.

3. Because the punishment threatened by the
law of works is such, as can never be eluctated,*
nor fully and completely borne by us ; therefore,
it is utterly impossible, that ever we should obtain
a personal righteousness of satisfaction.

Indeed, could we suffer it, and come from under
it, we should then be as righteous and innocent
as if we had never transgressed.

But this is utterly impossible. For,

(1.) Infinite justiee cannot be satisfied under
the rate of infinite punishment. In a full satisfac-
tion, the punishment must answer the greatness of
the offence. But every offence against God hath
an infinite heinousness in it, and therefore the
punishment for it must be infinite. Crimes are
greatened, not only from the nature of the action
as it is in itself flagitious ; but also from the
quality and dignity of the person, against whom
they are committed. Reviling and injurious
speeches against a man's equal are but actionable ;
but, against the king, they are treasonable. A
less offence against an excellent person, is more
heinous than against a more ignoble person. And,
consequently, God being of infinite majesty and
* Broken through, escaped.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 23

perfection, every offence against him must needs be
infinitely heinous ; and therefore must be infinitely
punished, before full satisfaction can be made
for it.

(2.) These are but two ways how a punishment
can be imagined to be infinite. The one is inten-
sively, when it is infinite in degrees : the other is
extensively, when it is infinite in duration and
continuance, though but finite in degree. If the
punishment be either of these ways infinite, it is
fully satisfactory and commensurate to the Divine
justice, which is infinite. But,

(3.) We cannot possibly suffer a punishment
which is infinite in degrees, because we ourselves
are but finite in our natures ; and what is finite
cannot contain what is infinite : yea, though God
should stretch and widen our capacities to the
utmost, yet we can never become vessels large
enough to hold infinite wrath at once. Therefore,

(4.) The punishment of sinners, because it can-
not be infinite in degrees, that it may be satisfac-
tory must be infinite in duration and continuance;
that so a finite, yet immortal creature, as the soul
of man is, may undergo a penalty some way infinite
as is the justice offended.

(5.) Because their punishment must be infinite
in duration, therefore it is utterly impossible that
ever it should be completely borne and eluctated,
since what is to last to all eternity can never be
accomplished. And, therefore, it is impossible
that ever we should procure to ourselves a righ-
teousness of satisfaction ; as impossible as it is to
outlive eternity, or to find a period in what must
continue for ever.

[1 .] But it may be objected : " Is not God's jus-
tice satisfied in the punishment of the damned ? why

24 THE DOCTRINE OF

else doth«he inflict it ? And, if justice be satisfied
in their damnation, how then can satisfaction be a
righteousness equivalent to innocence, since they
shall never be discharged from their torments?"

To this I answer —

That there never shall be any time, wherein
the justice of God shall be so fully satisfied by the
damned in hell, as to require no more sufferings
from them : for they shall be making satisfaction
to all eternity. The infinite justice of God is
satisfied in this, that it shall be satisfying itself to all
eternity : and yet, in all that eternity, there shall
be no one moment, wherein the sinner shall be able
to say it is finished, and justice is fully satisfied.

2. To this may be added, that the eternal suc-
cession of their torments is, in respect of God, a
permanent instant, a fixed and abiding now. So
that the very infinity of their punishment, in the
everlasting continuance of it, is accounted by God
(to whom " a thousand years," yea, thousands of
millions of years, " are but as yesterday when it is
past,") as now actually present and existing.
For, in his essence, there is no variation ; and, in
his knowledge, objects have no succession, besides
that of method and order.

[2.] " But how then," may some say, " were
the sufferings of Christ satisfactory, since they were
not infinite, nor eternal ?"

I answer —

That our Saviour Christ, being God as well
as man, and so an infinite Person, might well
bear the load of infinite degrees of wrath at once
laid upon him, and thereby complete his satisfac-
tion. So that his sufferings might be intensively
infinite, and yet not exceed the capacity of his
nature.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 25

Or, if any should scruple whether the punish-
ment of Christ were infinite in degrees, yet
we may affirm that the dignity of his person,
being God as well as man, might compound for
the measure of his sufferings, and shorten their
duration. For it is infinite suffering for an infinite
person to suffer, it being an infinite humiliation
and abasement. However, that punishment, which
is stretched out by the line of eternity when laid
upon the damned, was all wound up together when
inflicted on Christ. He, at one large draught,
drank off the cup of that fury, which they ever-
lastingly drain by little drops. And could they,
as he did, bear and eluctate the whole punishment
at once, they would thereby obtain a righteousness
of satisfaction, and be proceeded with as innocent,
or negatively righteous.

That is the third position.

4. Another position shall be this : Because we
can neither fulfil the commands of the law, nor
yet undergo and eluctate the utmost extremity of
the punishment ; therefore, our righteousness can-
not possibly be inherent or personal.

We cannot be personally righteous by perfect
obedience, because of the corruption of our natures :
we cannot be personally righteous by full satis-
faction, because of the condition of our natures.
Our corrupt state makes our perfect obedience a
thing impossible; and our limited finite state
makes our full satisfaction as impossible. As we
are fallen sinners, so we lie under a sad necessity
of transgressing the law : as we are vile creatures,
so we lie under an utter incapacity of recompens-
ing Divine justice. Well, therefore, might the
apostle cry out, " There is none righteous ; no,
not one," Rom. iii. 10. As for a personal righ-
c

26 THE DOCTRINE OF

teousness of obedience, the prophet unfolds that
goodly garment : " AU our righteousnesses are
but as filthy rags," Isa. lxiv. 6. Rags they are ;
and, therefore, cannot cover our nakedness : filthy
rags they are ; and, therefore, need a covering for
themselves. To think to cover filth by filth, is
nothing else but to make both more odious in the
sight of God.

Nor can we hope to appear before God upon a
righteousness of satisfaction: for how should we
satisfy his justice?

Is it by doing ?

Whatsoever we can do, is God's gift — our own
duty, had we never sinned — and can bear no pro-
portion to the sin commited : for no duty is of infi-
nite goodness ; but every sin is of infinite heinous-
ness, as hath been demonstrated ; and therefore no
duty can make satisfaction for it.

Is it by suffering, that we hope we may satisfy
God? Alas! this is nothing else, but to seek sal-
vation by being damned : for that is the penal part
of the law; and the only personal satisfaction, that
the justice of God will exact of sinners.

Now, though it be thus in vain to seek for a
righteousness of our own, either of the one kind or
of the other; yet that corruption of our natures,
which is the only cause why we have not a perfect
personal righteousness of obedience, still prompts
us insensibly to trust to it: and ready we are, upon
all occasions, to be drawing up an inventory of our
good works, as the merit of our justification ; which,
if they be really found, are but good evidences ot
it For,

The righteousness, which alone can justify vl
must be a righteousness either of obedience or satis-
faction; either doing what the law hath required,

THE TWO COVENANTS. 27

or suffering what it threatens: and, indeed, both
are necessary to bring us to heaven and happiness,
in a way of justification.

Perhaps God might, by the absolute prerogative
of his mercy, have pardoned and saved sinners,
without requiring any righteousness or satisfaction.
But I say, that it is utterly impossible and contra-
dictory, that he should justify any without a right-
eousness; for the very notion of justification doth
essentially connote* and infer a righteousness, since it
is God's owning and dealing with men as righteous.
For ought I know, God might, had he so pleased,
have pardoned and saved us without any right-
eousness; but, certain I am, he could not justify us
without it. Now that is no righteousness which
doth not fully answer the law which is the rule of
it: for the least defect destroys its nature, and
turns it into unrighteousness.

If it be here objected, that the rule of our right-
eousness is not the law of works, but the law of
faith; that the covenant of works is abolished, and
that of grace succeeds in the place thereof, which
requires faith, repentance, and sincere obedience
as the conditions of our justification ; and. that these
are now the righteousness by which we are justified :
I answer, by laying down,

6. A sixth position : that the covenant of works
is only so far forth repealed and abrogated, as it
did require a personal righteousness to our justifi-
cation ; but it is not repealed, as it did require a
perfect righteousness.

God did never so far disannul the covenant of

works, that, whether or not his law were obeyed or

his justice satisfied, yet we should be accounted

righteous : but, it is only thus far repealed by the

* Imply, include.

28 THE DOCTRINE OF

covenant of grace, that though we cannot perfectly
obey nor fully satisfy in our own persons, yet we
may be pardoned and accepted through the satis-
faction and obedience of our Surety. So that, even
now, under the covenant of grace, no righteousness
can avail to our justification, but what, for the mat-
ter of it, is perfectly conformable to the law of works.
And, when we say that the covenant of works is
abrogated, and that we are not to expect justifi-
cation according to that covenant, the meaning is
not, that the matter of that covenant is repealed,
but only the personal obligation relaxed : for still
it is the righteousness of the law which justifies us,
though performed by another. And, therefore, in
this sense, whosoever are justified, it is according
to the covenant of works; that is, it is by that
righteousness, which, for the substance and matter
of it, this covenant did require.

For the proof of this, which is of very great mo-
ment for the clearing the doctrine of justification,
consider,

(1.) That there can be no sufficient reason given
why our Saviour should suffer the penalty, who
never transgressed the precepts of the law, unless it
be that his sufferings might be our satisfaction.

Consequently, if Christ died for us, only to
satisfy Divine justice in our stead, and as our Surety,
it must necessarily follow, that this his death is our
righteousness of satisfaction according to the law
and covenant of works.

(2.) That law, according to the letter of which
the far greater part of the world shall be judged,
cannot be an abrogated, a repealed law.

But, though true believers shall indeed be judged
only according to the favourable construction of the
law of works, which is the accepting the righteous

THE TWO COVENANTS. 29

ness of their surety for their own ; yet all the rest
of the world (and how vast a number is it !) shall
be judged according to the strict letter of the cove-
nant of works, and must either stand or fall accord-
ing to the sentence of it: they must either produce
a perfect sinless righteousness, wrought out person-
ally by themselves ; or else suffer the vengeance of
eternal death. Indeed, all men, at the last day,
shall be judged by the covenant of works: and,
when they shall stand before the tribunal of God,
this law will be then produced, and every man's
title tried by it; and whoever cannot plead a right-
eousness conformable to the tenor and import of it,
must expect nothing else but the execution of the
punishment threatened. The righteousness of Christ
will be the believer's plea; and accepted, because
it fully answers the matter of the law. The rest of
the world can produce no righteousness of their
own, " for all have sinned;" Hor can they plead
this of Christ, because they have no faith, which
alone can give this title, and convey it to them : so
that their case is desperate, their doom certain, and
their punishment remediless and insupportable;
and this, according to the tenor of the covenant
of works, " Do this," or " Suffer this," by which
God will proceed in judging of the world.

Consider, again,

(3.) That the matter and substance of the cove-
nant of works is nothing else but the moral law,
(as I showed before,) the law of holiness and obe-
dience : the obligation of which continues still
upon us ; and the least transgression of which is
threatened with death and condemnation.

" What, then! doth God speak contradictions?
and, in the law of works, tell us he will not
punish every transgressor V* No, certainly : his
c2

30 THE DOCTRINE OF

truth and his justice are immutable ; and what he
hath once spoken with his mouth, he will fulfil
with his hand. And his veracity is obliged to
punish every offender ; for God can be no more
false in his threatenings, than in his promises :
and, therefore, he punisheth those whom he par-
dons, or else he could not pardon. He pardons
their persons, according to his covenant of grace :
he punisheth their Surety, according to his cove-
nant of works : which, in a forensic sense, being
the punishing of them, they have in him made a
satisfaction to the justice of God, and thereby
have obtained a righteousness according to the
terms of the covenant of works.

I have the longer insisted on this sixth position,
because it is the very critical point of the doctrine
of justification, and the very hinge upon which all
the controversies concerning it do turn.

7. Another position shall be this — That,
though we have no personal righteousness, yet
our Saviour Christ hath a personal righteousness
of both kinds, both of perfect obedience to the
commands of the law, and of full satisfaction to
the penalty threatened in it.

(1.) Christ hath wrought out a righteousness of
perfect obedience ; and that by his absolute con-
formity to a twofold law.

[1.] The law natural, under the obligation of
which he lay as a man.

For both the first and second Adam were made
under the same law of works : the first, under the
mutability of his own will, which forfeited his hap-
piness ; the second, under a necessity or infalli-
bility of entire obedience, through the union of
the Divine nature with the human, whereby it
became as impossible that Christ should fail in his

THE TWO COVENANTS. 31

obedience, as that the Godhead should fail the hu-
man nature which it had assumed.

[2.] To the law national, under the obligation
of which he was born, as being of the seed of Abra-
ham, and of the tribe of Judah.

By this national law, I mean both the judicial
and ceremonial laws of the Jews, of whom Christ
was, according to the flesh. For even the cere-
monial law was, in a sense, national, and peculiar
to the Jews : yea, and they themselves thought so,
seeing they did not impose the observation of the
Mosaical rites and observances upon proselyted
heathens, (those whom they called Proselyti
Porta*) but admitted them to the participation
of the same common hope and salvation with
themselves, upon the observation of the law of
nature, and the seven traditional commandments
of Noah. Now Christ was made under both these
laws ; the law of his nature, and the law of his
nation : under the former, primarily and neces-
sarily, as he was man ; and, therefore, he must
obey the law of right reason : under the second,
secondarily and by consequence ; because the law
of nature and right reason dictates that God is to
be obeyed in all his positive commands. Where-
fore he himself tells us, that it became him " to
fulfil all righteousness," Mat. iii. 15.

Thus, then, his righteousness of obedience was
both personal and perfect.

And so, likewise,

(2.) His righteousness of satisfaction was per-
sonal and plenary.

As Divine justice could exact no punishment
from him, upon his own personal account, he

* Proselytes of the gate, who professed the Jewish reli-
gion, but had not been circumcised.

32 THE DOCTRINE OF

being holy, harmless, and undefiled ; so did it re-
ceive full satisfaction from him, for the sins of
others imputed to him. Neither came he from
under the penalty, till he had discharged the very
uttermost farthing that was due. And therefore
his active and passive obedience, as they are com-
monly termed, were both perfect and complete.
What the sufferings of Christ were ; how far he
paid the idem* and how far the tantidem,\ I shall
not discuss. The Greek liturgy checks our too
curious inquisitiveness in this search, by calling
them ayvio^n iradi], " unknown sufferings."

Only it may be here queried, " Since that all
righteousness is a conformity to some law, accord-
ing to what law was Christ obliged to undergo the
penalty for sin ? Could the same law bind him to
obedience and suffering too ? Or is it consistent
with the measures of justice, to inflict the penalty
of the law on him, who had fully observed the
commands of it V

To this I answer — That the same law cannot
oblige both to obedience and to suffering: and,
therefore, Christ Jesus was not bound over to
undergo the penalty by that law, the precepts of
which he had fulfilled. Had he been liable to
suffer by the same law that we are, he would not
have been a mediator, but a malefactor.

Christ was, therefore, under a twofold law, in
conformity to which he obtained his twofold
righteousness.

[1.] The common and ordinary law of obedience,
unto which he, as well as others, was subjected
upon the account of his human nature.

[2.] The peculiar law of the mediator.

By the law of the mediator I mean, that com-
* The same. t Just so much.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 33

pact and engagement, which Christ entered into
with God the Father, to become our Surety, to pay
our debts, and to bear the punishment due to our
sins ; which I shall hereafter more largely open to
you, when I come to treat of the covenant of re-
demption.

Now when Christ had perfectly fulfilled the
common and ordinary law, both of his nature as a
man, and of his nation as a Jew, it could in no wise
be just, that he should also undergo the penalty
by virtue of this law, which threatened it only
against the transgressors. And, therefore, when
the ordinary law acquitteth and dischargeth him as
righteous, the law of the mediator interposeth,
seizeth on him, and bindeth him over unto punish-
ment. And, if Christ had not borne this punish-
ment, though still he would have been personally
righteous as a man, yet he would not have been
righteous as a mediator, because not conformable
to the law of the mediation or suretiship, to which
he had voluntarily subjected himself, and which
obliged him to suffer, John x. 18, Phil. ii. 8, but,
the obligation of both laws being fully answered, he
hath thereby obtained a righteousness according
unto both; and, being both perfect in his obe-
dience, and perfected by his sufferings, he is be-
come an Almighty Saviour, " able to save unto the
uttermost all" those who " come unto God by him."

That is the seventh position.

8. Christ having such an abundant righteous-
ness of his own, God, the Lawgiver, hath been gra-
ciously pleased to bestow that righteousness upon,
and impute it unto us ; to all intents and purposes,
as if it had been our own personal righteousness.

And in this particular lies the great mystery of
our justification.

34 THE DOCTRINE OF

And therefore, to explain it, I shall lay down
these two things :

(1 .) Imputed righteousness is not God's account-
ing us righteous when we are not so ; for that would
be a false judgment, and utterly inconsistent with
the truth, wisdom, and righteousness of the Divine
nature : but, first, the righteousness of Christ is
become ours, by the conveyance which God hath
appointed to make it over unto us; and, then, it is
imputed or reckoned for our justification.

For the imputation of Christ's righteousness is
not res vaga* that which may agree with any
person in any state and condition ; as if there were
no more required to justify the most profligate
sinner, but only that God reckon him righteous :
no ; but there must be something presupposed in
us, either as a qualification, condition, or means,
that must give us a title to the righteousness of
Christ. And that is, as shall appear in the next
position, the grace of faith : so that, Christ's
righteousness being made ours by faith, God doth
then actually impute it to our justification.

And, therefore, the righteousness of Jesus Christ
is not by God only thought to be ours ; but it is
ours really and truly, in a law sense. To affirm,
that God imputes that to be ours which indeed is
not, would be to make it only a putative righte-
ousness, to invade the Divine verity, and to lay
the imputation of a false and partial judgment
upon him. The righteousness of Christ is not
ours, because God accounts it to be so ; but, on
the contrary, therefore God accounts it ours, be-
cause it is so. It becomes not ours, by God's im-
putation ; for it must be ours, before any act of
imputation can be true and just: but, rather, it
* An undefined thing.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 35

becomes ours by Divine designation or donation,
whereby God hath made over the righteousness of
his Son as a dowry and patrimony to faith. God
doth not justify us, that we may be righteous, but
because we are already righteous ; and that, not
only imperfectly, by the inherent righteous qua-
lities that are implanted in our regeneration ; but
most perfectly, by the righteousness of Christ con-
signed over unto us in our regeneration, by virtue
of faith, which is a main part of it.

Certainly, that God, who hath told us that
" he that justifieth the wicked— is an abomina-
tion" unto him, Prov. xvii. 15; will never him-
self make that the process of his justice. It is
true, the apostle saith, that God "justifieth the
ungodly," Rom. iv. 5, but this must be under-
stood, either in a limited sense, for those who are
in part so, being but in part sanctified ; or, rather,
it must be understood, not in a compounded sense,
as if ungodliness and justification were states com-
patible to the same person ; but in a divided sense,
that is, that he justifies such who heretofore were
ungodly; but their sanctification intervenes be-
tween their ungodliness and their justification.
In which order the apostle recounts it, 1 Cor. vi.
11. "Such were some of you; but ye are —
sanctified, but ye are justified." So that, in order
of nature, faith, which is a principal part of our
sanctification, precedes our right to Christ's righ-
teousness, because it conveys it ; and our right to
Christ's righteousness precedes God's actual im-
putation of it to our justification, because it must
first be ours, before it can be with truth ac-
counted so.

It is very wonderful, that the papists should so
obstinately resolve not to understand this doctrine

36 THE DOCTRINE OF

of imputed righteousness; but still cavil against
it, as a contradiction : it being, say they, as utterly
impossible to become righteous through the righte-
ousness of another, as to become healthful through
another's health, or wise by another's wisdom.
And some, besides this slander of a contradiction,
give us this scoff into the bargain — that the pro-
testants, in defending an imputative righteousness,
shew only an imputative modesty and imputative
learning. But they might do well to consider,
that some denominations are physical ; others only
legal and juridical. Those which are physical,
do indeed necessarily require inexistent forms,
from which the denominations should result: thus,
to be healthful, and to be wise and learned, do
require inherent health, wisdom, and learning.
But, to be righteous, may be taken either in a
physical sense, and so it denotes an inherent righ-
teousness, which in the best is imperfect ; or else
it may be taken in a forensic or juridical sense,
and so the perfect righteousness of another, who is
our Surety, may become ours, and be imputed to
our justification. It is the righteousness of another,
personally ; it is our righteousness, juridically :
because by faith, we have a right and title to it ;
which right and title accrue unto us, by the pro-
mise and covenant of God, and our union to our
Surety.

Indeed, some there are, who refer our justifica-
tion wholly to the merits of Jesus Christ ; but yet
lay down a scheme and method of this doctrine,
not altogether so honourable to our blessed Saviour
as they ought. These affirm,* that Christ, by his
righteousness, hath merited that God should ac-
count our faith to be itself our righteousness : that
* Armin. Disp. Theol. thes. 17

THE TWO COVENANTS. 37

his is only the procatarctic * or meritorious cause
procuring- this grand privilege to faith, that it
should itself be our righteousness, and the matter
ofo^ir justification. Wherein they are so far in-
jurious to the merits of our blessed Saviour, as to
make them only the remote cause of our justifica-
tion ; and, consequently, necessary, rather that
faith might have an object, than that we might
have righteousness. But of this, perhaps, more
hereafter.

However, this which hath been spoken may
serve to give us a more clear and distinct notion
of imputed righteousness ; which is not ours,
merely because God imputes it to us; but be-
cause he hath, by deed of gift in his promise,
bestowed it upon us when we believe, and then
imputes it to our justification.

(2.) That this righteousness of Christ, thus made
ours, may serve to all ends and purposes for which
we stand in need of a righteousness, it is necessary
that both his active righteousness, or his righte-
ousness of obedience, and also his passive righte-
ousness, the righteousness of his satisfaction in
suffering for us, be made ours, and imputed to us
for our justification.

Though this position be much controverted ; yet,
possibly, the truth of it will appear from the grounds
formerly laid, namely, that there are two ends, for
which we stand in need of a righteousness : the one
is, a freeing of us from the penalty threatened;
the other is, an entitling of us to the reward pro-
mised. Now, had we no other but the righteous-
ness of Christ's satisfaction made over unto us, this
indeed would perfectly free us from our liableness
to punishment; for, if our Surety hath undergone
* The first or beginning cause,

38 THE DOCTRINE OP

for us, we ourselves are not liable : but still we
should need a righteousness to entitle us to the
reward ; and that, must necessarily be a righteous-
ness of perfect obedience. For, as I noted before,
it is not said, Suffer this, and live; but, Do this, and
live: and, consequently, it must be obedience, and
not suffering, the active and not the passive right-
eousness of Christ, that can give us a right unto
eternal life. It is true, the satisfaction of Christ
doth give a right unto eternal life concomitantly, but
not formally; that is, wherever guilt is removed,
there a title to heaven is procured : yet the formal
reason of our title to heaven is different from the
formal reason of the remission of our sins : this results
from the imputation of Christ's sufferings; that, of
his obedience.

But if any should in this particular dissent, as
many very orthodox divines (Piscator and others)
have done, upon the account of the impossibility of
a neutral estate, that is, a condition neither of hap-
piness nor misery, life nor death ; I will not earnestly
contend about it: so that this foundation stand firm
and unshaken, that we are saved only by the right-
eousness of Christ made ours by God's donation,
and imputed to our justification. Yet Rom. v. 18,
19, votes for it.

9. This righteousness of Christ is conveyed and
made over unto us by our faith.

That is the grace which God hath purposed to
honour with our justification.

I shall not long insist upon this, because I
reserve the more full handling of it to another
place. Only this is here to be observed, that faith
gives us a title to the righteousness of Christ, and
makes it ours, not only by the promise of God, but
as it is the bond of union between Christ and the

THE TWO COVENANTS. 39

soul. By faith it is, that we are made mystically
one with Christ; living members in his body; fruit-
ful \branches of that heavenly and spiritual Vine.
We have the communication of the same name:
" So also is Christ," saith the apostle, 1 Cor. xii. 12.
speaking there of Christ mystical, both his person
and his church. We have the same relations: " I
ascend unto my Father, and to your Father," John
xx. 17. We are made partakers of the same Spirit :
for " if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he
is none of his," Rom. viii. 9. " He, that is joined
unto the Lord is one spirit," 1 Cor. vi. 17. And,
finally, the very life that we live, is said not to be
ours, but " Christ liveth in us," and that we " live
by the faith of the Son of God," Gal. ii. 20.

So that, being thus one with Christ, his right-
eousness becomes our righteousness, even as our
sins became his : and God deals with Christ and
believers, as if they were one person : the sins of
believers are charged upon Christ, as though they
were his ; and the righteousness of Christ is reckoned
to believers as theirs. Neither is God unjust,
either in the one or the other imputation ; because
they are mystically one: and this mystical union
is a sufficient ground for imputation.

Yet from this union flows the participation only
of the benefits of his mediatorship ; for we are not
hereby transubstantiated or deified, as some of late
years have blasphemously conceited. Neither the
Godhead of Christ, nor his essential righteousness
as God, nor his Divine and infinite properties, are
made ours; but only the fruits and effects of his
mediation: so that, hereupon, God graciously ac-
counts of us as if we had done in our own persons
whatsoever Christ hath done for us; because, by
faith, Christ and we are made one.

40 THE DOCTRINE OF

These are the positions which I thought ne-
cessary, to instruct us in a true notion of right-
eousness, and the manner how we become right-
eous.

I shall deduce from them a few corollaries.

1. Hence we learn the true difference that there
is between the covenant of grace, and the covenant
of works.

Whatsoever vast disproportion some have ima-
gined, yet, indeed, these are not distinct covenants
for the matter and substance of them, but only in
the distinct method and manner of participating
the same righteousness. They both require full
satisfaction, to obtain remission of sin ; and perfect
obedience, to obtain eternal life. But in this lies
the only difference ; that the rigour and severity of
the covenant of works requires that this righteous-
ness be personal, and wrought out by ourselves;
which is relaxed to us by the covenant of grace,
promising us remission and acceptation through
the righteousness of our Surety, conveyed to us by
our faith.

Hence see, what influence faith hath into our
justification.

It is not itself our righteousness, or the matter
of our justification ; but the instrument or means,
call it which you please, of conveying over unto
us the righteousness of Christ our Surety, which
is perfectly conformable to the law of works, and
the matter by which we are justified.

Some there are, who would have faith to justify
us, as it is the fulfilling of the condition of the
covenant of grace.

But, possibly, this difference might be soon
compromised, if the tenor of both covenants be

THE TWO COVENANTS. 41

needfully observed. The covenant of works pro-
miseth life, if we obey in our own persons : but
tlife covenant of grace relaxeth this; and promiseih
life, if we obey in our Surety. The condition of
both is perfect obedience : in the one, personal ;
in the other, imputed. And the way how we
should obtain a title to this obedience of our
Surety, is, by believing. So that, when the
covenant of grace saith, " Believe, and you shall
be saved," it speaks compendiously; and, were
it drawn out at length, it would run thus, " Pro-
cure the righteousness of Christ to be thine, and
thou shalt be saved : believe, and this righteous-
ness, which will save thee, shall be thine."

Here, then, are two conditions : the one, fun-
damental, primary, and immediate to our justifi-
cation ; and that is, the righteousness of Christ :
the other, remote and' secondary ; and that is, our
faith, which is the condition of the primary con-
dition, and consequently of the covenant. This
will appear more evident in this syllogism : if the
righteousness of Christ be made thine, thou shalt
be saved ; if thou believest, the righteousness of
Christ shall be made thine : therefore, from the first
to the last, if thou believest, thou shalt be saved.

Now, though Christ's obedience be the prin-
cipal, and our faith the secondary condition ; yet,
usually, in propounding the covenant of grace, the
former is silenced, and the latter only mentioned.

And this may be for two reasons :

(1.) Because, though Christ's righteousness be
more immediate to our justification, yet faith is
more immediate to our practice ; and, therefore, it
is of more concernment to know how justification
might be obtained, than critically to know wherein
it doth consist. And,

d2

42 THE DOCTRINE OF

(2.) Because faith doth necessarily relate unto
the righteousness of Jesus Christ. So that, to
say, " Believer and you shall be saved," doth
virtually and implicitly tell us also, that our justi-
fication and salvation must be by the righteousness
of another.

If, therefore, those who affirm that faith jus-
tifies, as it is the performance of the condition of
the covenant, intend it only in this remote and
secondary sense, I see no cause of controversy or
disagreement about it.

That is a second corollary*

(3.) Another inference may be this — That we
should never expect justification nor salvation,
upon any other terms than a perfect righteous-
ness, fully answering the tenor of the covenant of
works.

Answering it, I say, as to the substance of what
it requires, although the manner of obtaining that
righteousness be not conformable thereunto, bul
unto the law of grace. If we cannot produce a
righteousness every way perfect, and tender it to
God as ours, we cannot with reason expect but
that God should seek for satisfaction to his justice
upon us in our everlasting destruction. Ours it
must be, through our union to Jesus Christ by
the bond of faith ; which is a sufficient foundation
for a real communication of all benefits and
interests.

(4.) Hence we may learn, that the two righ-
teousnesses of which the text speaks, the righte-
ousness which is of works, and the righteousness
which is of faith,, do not differ as to the nature of
the things themselves, but only as to the manner
of their being made ours.

The righteousness, which is of the law, must be

THE TWO COVENANTS. 43

perfect obedience, or of full satisfaction ; " the
righteousness, which is of faith," is both of obe-
dience and of satisfaction : so that, for the matter,
there is no difference between them ; for the
righteousness of faith is no other than what the
law of works required. But, herein lies the only
difference, that the one must be personal, the
other imputed. The law requires obedience or
satisfaction to be wrought out in our own persons :
grace mitigates this strictness, and is contented
with the obedience and satisfaction of another,
apprehended and applied to us by our believing.

And thus you see, at large, the nature of
righteousness, both legal and evangelical ; wherein
they do consist ; and what is the true difference
between them. The knowledge of these things is
of absolute necessity to a clear perception of the
doctrine of the covenants, and of justification.
Some, perhaps, because these truths are abstruse
and knotty, may think that I am teaching you, as
Gideon is said to have taught the men of Succoth,
Judges viii. 7. with the thorns and briers of the
wilderness. Yet I doubt not but, by a diligent
recollection of what hath been delivered, you may,
even of these thorns, gather figs. Sure I am, that
God, who once spake to Moses out of a bush, can
speak to you out of these thickets. And, though
they do not so immediately tend to the exciting of
affections, yet those affections may be well sus-
pected to be irregular, and experience shews they
are seldom durable, that are not built upon a right
information of the judgment.

These things being thus discussed and stated,
let us now proceed to a more distinct and particu-
lar consideration of the covenants : which I have

44 THE DOCTRINE OF

told you were principally two: the one, made with
mankind in Adam, at his first creation ; the other,
made with mankind, upon his restoration. The
tenor of the former is, " Do this, and live :" the
tenor of the latter, He that believeth on Christ
Jesus, shall be saved.

I. I shall first treat concerning the former, the
covenant of works : the sum of which is, " Do
this, and live ; or, in the words of my text, " The
man, which doeth those things, shall live by
them."

And, herein, two things are chiefly to be ob-
served : the promise, which is life ; and the condi-
tion, which is, " Do this," or perfect obedience.

First. I shall begin with the former, the promise
made unto Adam, and all mankind in him : " The
man, which doeth those things, shall live;" which,
by the rule of contraries, implies the threatening
and curse against all transgressors. If he shall
live, who fulfilleth law ; then, by the contrary pro-
portion, he shall die, who transgresseth it. And
this threatening we find expressly annexed to one
particular command of the covenant of works :
" In the day that thou eatest thereof," that is, of
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, " thou
shalt surely die," Gen. ii. 17. : and to the general
tenor of the whole ; " Cursed is every one, that
continueth not in all things, which are written in
the book of the law to do them," Gal. iii. 10.

Concerning this life and death, much difficulty
there is to state wherein they did consist ; and,
truly, the Holy Ghost having spoken so sparingly
of it, it would be presumption, and an affectation
of being wise above what is written, to determine
any thing positively and magisterially herein ; God
taking more care to inform us how we might

THE TWO COVENANTS. 45

recover our lost and forfeited bliss, than wherein it
consisted. Yet, possibly, something may, with
modesty and probability, be spoken of it ; that
nflay give us some satisfaction in the clearing up,
if not of all, yet of some truths that are pertinent
to this subject, and worthy our knowledge and
acceptance.

1. As for the life here promised,

(1.) There are two opinions, that carry a fair
probability.

[1.] That, by life here, is meant the perpetuity
and continuance of that estate wherein Adam was
created ; being a state of perfect happiness and
blessedness, free from sin, and therefore free from
misery : he, the friend of God and lord of the
visible creation; all things being subject unto him,
and himself subject only to his Maker : there
being a perfect agreement between his God and
him, and between him and himself; no tormenting
conscience, no gnawing guilt, no pale fears, no
pains, no sickness, no death. He might converse
with God, boldly and sweetly : and God would
have conversed with him, familiarly and endear-
ingly. Then there would have been no desertion
on God's part ; because no apostacy on his : no
clouds in his mind, no tempest in his breast, no
tears, nor cause for any ; but a continual calm and
serenity of soul, enjoying all the innocent delights
that God and nature could afford, and all this for
ever. The whole world had been but a higher
heaven, and a lower. Earth had been but heaven
a little allayed ; and Adam had been as an angel
incarnate, and God all in all : and all this to be
enjoyed eternally, without diminution, without
period. Oh, how great a happiness may we con-
ceive the state of upright man to be ! which

46 THE DOCTRINE OF '

nothing can resemble, nothing exceed ; unless it
be the happiness and bliss to which fallen man
shall be restored. Had not sin soiled and drossed
the world, it should never have felt the purgation
of the last fire : the elements should never have
been dissolved, the heavens folded up, nor the
host of them disbanded ; but man had been
the everlasting inhabitant of an everlasting
world.

This is the first opinion concerning the life pro-
mised in the covenant of works.

[2.] Others again, to avoid some inconveniences
which might follow upon the former opinion,
whereof the greatest seems to be a populousness
beyond what the world could contain, think it more
probable to affirm, that, when the multitude of
mankind (which certainly had been far greater
than all the generations since the beginning of it
amount unto, since sin and the curse have hindered
the fecundity of the first blessing,) had so far
increased as to straiten the bounds of their abode,
God would have translated them to heaven, without
their seeing or tasting of death. As, when a land
is surcharged with inhabitants, the state transplants
whole colonies of them, to disburden itself; so, when
this earth should have been crowded with an over-
plus of mankind, God would have transplanted
whole colonies of them, and would have removed
them from a terrestrial to a celestial paradise.
God doth now, indeed, remove believers to that
state of happiness ; but yet they first descend into
the dust ; death is their passage into life, and the
grave their entrance into glory. We read but of
two men only who leaped that ditch, and they were
Enoch and Elijah : of the one, it is said that God
took him ; and of the other, that God fetched him

THE TWO COVENANTS. 47

in a fiery chariot. But, had not sin come into the
world, this might have been the common and
ordinary passage out of it. Eve had never been
terrified by the king of terrors, nor struggled at his
approach, nor feared nor detested the separation of
those dear companions, the soul and body ; for
there had been no such thing as death, but both
soul and body, jointly, and at once, should have
been rapt up to the enjoyment of the same God,
and the same happiness, which our faith now em-
braces, and our hope expects.

Which of these two is the very truth, I cannot
determine ; though the grand inconvenience con-
sequent upon the former may incline a considering
mind to adhere rather to the latter.

(2.) Now, here fall in two questions to be
resolved.

Whether Adam, in innocence, may be said to be
immortal ?

What is meant by the tree of life spoken of in
the history of Adam, and said to be planted in the
midst of paradise ?

[1.] To the first I answer, that Adam, in his
state of innocence, was immortal.

For sin is not only the sting, but the cause and
parent of death, and gives it not only its terrors,
but its being. What saith the apostle ? " By one
man sin entered into the world, and death by sin,"
Rom. v. 12 ; so that, had there been no sin, there
had been no death. But yet, even then, Adam
had in him the contemperation* of contrary quali-
ties, and, therefore, the principles of death and
corruption. And, therefore, his immortality was
not such as the angels enjoy in heaven ; for they
are not composed of jarring and quarrelling
* Admixture, tempering together.

48 THE DOCTRINE OF

elements, being pure spiritual substances : nor was it
such as the bodies of glorified saints shall hereafter
possess ; for they shall be made wholly impassible,*
and set free from the reach of outward impressions,
and the discords of elemental mutinies, that might
impair their vigour, or endanger their dissolution.
But it was an immortality by donation, and by the
privilege of an especial providence, which engaged
itself to sway and overrule that tendency which was
in his body to corruption, and, notwithstanding the
contrarieties and dissensions of a terrestrial consti-
tution, to continue him in life so long as he should
continue himself in his obedience,

[2.] And, as a means and sacrament of this, God
appointed the fruit of the tree of life, that the eat-
ing thereof might perpetuate his duration.

Which tree of life, what it was, and why so
called, was the second query.

Some suppose it was so named, because the fruit
of it had a natural virtue to preserve and prolong
life, and that Adam, using it as his ordinary food,
should, by the medicinal force of it, have kept off
or repaired all incident decays. But this, I think,
sounds somewhat of the rabbi ; for the guard which
God set upon this tree, lest fallen Adam should
once taste it, and live for ever, sufficiently over-
throws this conceit, and evinces that immortality
could not be the natural effect and production
of it.

But the best and more received opinion is, that
it was therefore called the tree of life, because it
was a sacrament added for the confirmation of the
promise of life. That, as now, under the covenant
of grace, God hath instituted baptism and the
Lord's supper, that, by being washed with the
, * Incapable of suffering.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 49

water of the one, and eating and drinking the bread
and wine of the other, he might seal to us the
stability of that covenant wherein he hath promised
eternal life to those who believe ; so God gave
Adam this tree of life, that, by his eating thereof,
he might seal to him the faithfulness of the cove-
nant of works, wherein he had promised life to him,
if he would obey ; that, as sure as he tasted of the
fruit of that tree, so sure he should live, if he would
perform the commands of God. For every cove-
nant hath its sacraments, or seals, annexed to it.
The old covenant of grace was sealed by circum-
cision, called, therefore, "a seal of the righteous-
ness of faith," Rom. iv. 11 ; and, likewise, the
passover was another sacrament of that covenant :
the new covenant of grace is sealed by baptism and
the Lord's supper. And, in like manner, the cove-
nant of works was sealed by the fruit of this tree of
life, which was so called, not from any inherent
quality of its own, but only sacramentally, because
it did confirm the promise of life ; that, as surely
as Adam did eat thereof, so surely he should live,
if he would obey.

(3.) By these obscure and uncertain things,
which cannot be recommended unto you as un-
doubted verities, but only as probable conjectures,
you may perceive how much we are in the dark,
and how subject to error, when we pretend to
define, and positively determine what the Holy
Ghost hath thought fit to conceal.

Yet two things I account most certain; and,
with which, it will be good to put a stop to our
inquisitiveness.

[1.] That this life, promised in the covenant of
works, was a state, made happy and blessed by
the confluence of all good things, outward and

50 THE DOCTRINE OF

inward, temporal and spiritual ; whatsoever man's
condition could need, or his will desire.

So long as there were no defects of righteous-
ness and holiness in his nature, there would have
been none of happiness suitable to his capacities ;
nor should he have any complaints to make, nor
cause for them.

[2.] That this life, whether eternal on earth or
in heaven, though so perfectly happy in its kind;
yet was far short of that glory and happiness
which is now promised to believers under the
covenant of grace.

Christ not only died to redeem a forfeiture, but
his obedience merited the purchase of a richer
inheritance, and he will instate his in the possession
of far more transcendent glory. Adam was never so
happy in his innocence, as he is now, since his fall,
by his faith and repentance. He is now exalted
far higher than at first he stood. And, therefore,
Gregory the Great, considering the advantage
which we have gained by our restoration through
Christ, could not forbear exclaiming, 0 felix culpa,
qua talem meruit habere Redemptorem! " Happy
sin, that obtained such a Redeemer !" And Clemens
Alexandrinus hath a like passage : o zk TrapaSeiou
tteouv fj.tt.£ti)v viraKorjQ adXov ttpavoQ a7ro\ajupavei.
" His disobedience cast Adam out of Paradise :
his obedience instates him in a far higher and
greater reward, even heaven." So that, as Christ
saith concerning John the Baptist, " Among all
that are born of women, there hath not arisen a
greater than he ; yet, he that is least in the king-
dom of heaven is greater ;" the same may I say
concerning. Adam in innocence. Among all the
visible creation, there was none greater nor more
happy than he ; yet, the least believer, who is now

THE TWO COVENANTS. 51

in the kingdom of heaven, is far greater than he,
when he was lord of Paradise.

Yea, should we suppose that Adam, after he
had long continued in his innocence and obedi-
ence, should have been assumed into heaven ; yet
a believer's glory there, purchased by the merits
of his Saviour, shall far outshine whatsoever glory
Adam could have acquired by his own obedience.
For, so much approximation and union as there is
of the creature unto God, the fountain of all glory ;
so much participation is there of glory from God,
by the creature. Now, Adam's union unto God
was only moral ; such a union as love and friend-
ship doth beget : but a believer's union unto God
is nearer, and mystical, and ineffable ; and, there-
fore, from this nearer union will flow a greater
glory. God hath wedded our nature to himself,
in the hypostatical union ; and he hath wedded
our persons to himself, in a mystical union : neither
of which could have had place under the covenant
of works; and, therefore, the union not being so
great and close, the glory promised therein would
not have been so glorious, nor the life and immor-
tality so blessed, as that which is now brought to
light by the gospel.

This you may take, in answer to the first ques-
tion, What the life is, that is promised in the
covenant of works : " The man, which doeth those
things, shall live by them."

2. Our next inquiry is, What death it is, that
this covenant threatens : " In the day that thou
eatest thereof, thou shalt die the death." And
herein, truly, we are almost as far to seek, as in
the former.

(1.) Yet thus much is certain

[I.] That, by death, is meant the separation of

52 THE DOCTRINE OF

the soul and body, which is it temporal death :
together with all its forerunners and concomitants;
pain, grief, weakness, sickness, and whatsoever
doth either cause it, or attend it.

[2.] It is also certain, that here is meant
spiritual death ; the loss of the image and favour
of God ; a despoiling the soul of the ornaments of
knowledge, grace, and righteousness, with which
in its first creation it was beautified. For, as the
separation of the soul from the body is the tempo-
ral death of the man; so the separation of the soul
from the love and grace of God, is the spiritual
death of the soul. And,

[3.] As certain it may be, that hereby is meant
likewise an eternal death, to endure for ever,
because to be inflicted by an infinite justice.

(2.) But the main difficulty is, whether this
eternal death should have consisted in the utter
annihilation of the soul, after its separation from
the body by a temporal death ; or whether both
soul and body should have been again united, to
suffer eternally some torments proportionable to
those which the damned now suffer in hell.

To this I shall give you what I judge most
probable.

And that is,

[1.] That the death threatened in the covenant of
works would not have been the utter annihilation of
the guilty soul, after its separation from the body.

Because annihilation is not a punishment suited
to the eternall y glorifying of God's j ustice and power ;
since it would be in one moment transacted, and
put the soul out of the reach and from under the
dominion of omnipotency itself: for, although non
esse be maximum malum metaphysicum ;* yet,
* Although non-existence ia the chief metaphysical evil.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 53

certainly, God will not glorify himself by metaphy-
sical notions, but by physical and sensible punish-
ments.

[2.] Whatsoever punishment had been eternally
inflicted, either upon the separate soul alone, as
some hold, or upon the whole man, both soul and
body, as others affirm, had been more mild and
mitigated under the covenant of works, than now
the torments of the damned will be, who have
despised the covenant of grace.

For, as the life promised then was inferior to the
life promised now ; so the death threatened then
was not so rigorous, so tormenting, as the death
threatened now. Certainly, the tenders that are
made to men, of Christ, and salvation by him, are
not mere indifferent things ; that, though they
slight and reject them, yet they shall be in no
worse condition than when they were born : but a
despised Saviour, an abused grace, a neglected
salvation, are such things as will add rage to the
unquenchable fire ; and make it eat deeper into
the soul, than if there had been no Saviour pro-
vided, no grace offered, no salvation purchased;
but they had been all left in their first fallen estate,
without hope, without means, without possibility of
recovery.

And thus much concerning the life promised, and
the death threatened, in the covenant of works.

(3.) Only, it may be queried, how God verified
this threatening upon Adam. The threatening
runs thus : " In the day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die;" and yet we read that Adam
lived nine hundred years, and more, after this
peremptory sentence. How is this consistent
with God's justice and veracity, who not only
did not inflict death on him on the day of his
e2

54 THE DOCTRINE OF

transgression, but reprieved him for many hundred
years after?

To this I answer, briefly ; that, when it is said,
" In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
die," by this is not meant, that he should presently
upon his sinning undergo actual death ; nor only
that death should be then due unto him, as some
would have it, for so it might, and yet never have
been inflicted : but the meaning is, that he should
be liable and obnoxious, yea, and ordained to
death : death should certainly be inflicted on him,
in the time, that God had appointed, and which he
foresaw would make most for the glory of his holi-
ness and justice. " In that day thou shalt die,"
is no more, than " In that day thou shalt be a
mortal creature : thy life shall be forfeited to justice,
to be cut off whensoever the righteous and holy
God shall please."

Second. Let us, in the next place, proceed to
consider the condition of the covenant of works ;
and that the apostle tells us is, " Do this : The
man, which doeth those things, shall live by them.'"
By doing these things is meant obedience, both in-
ks perfection and perseverance ; for perfect obe-
dience could not justify, unless it were persevering
obedience ; for we find that Adam himself was not
justified by his perfect conformity to the law for a
time, because he did not continue in it.

Concerning this obedience, which was required
in the covenant of works, we may observe,

1. That the rule of Adam's obedience in his state
of innocence was principally the dictates and
promptings of his own nature, and secondarily any
positive law that should be given him by God.

So that, when God bids him do this and live, he
doth but point him inwards to see what was written

THE TWO COVENANTS. 55

upon his own heart, and to act suitably thereunto.
God gave him one command, which was not written
there; and that was, not to eat of the tree of know-
ledge of good and evil. And some suppose also
the command of sanctifying the sabbath-day to
have been a positive law given to Adam, Gen. ii. 3.
where it is said, " God blessed the seventh day, and
sanctified it:" others suppose those words to be
brought in only by way of prolepsis, or anticipation.
However that be, yet certain it is, that God laid
very few injunctions upon upright man, besides
what the dictates of his very nature and reason did
prompt him to: but, if any more had been then
imposed on him, they would all have been ulti-
mately resolved into that grand law of nature, that
whatsoever God commands we ought to obey. And,
therefore, though the not eating the fruit of such
a tree were not a law of nature, yet this was, that
he ought not to have done what God forbade him.
So that, " Do this," was to Adam no more than
" Act only according to the rules of nature and right
reason, and thou shalt live."

2. The covenant of works required of Adam all
those things which are now required of us under
the covenant of grace; except it be those which
suppose a sinful and a fallen state.

Some duties there are, which are in themselves
absolute and perfect, and do not presuppose any
sin or corruption in our nature : and such are, to love
God; to reverence and worship him; to depend
upon him, and believe in him; and to commit all
our affairs, and the conduct of our whole lives, to
his guidance and government. Other duties there
are, which do necessarily connote and presuppose
imperfection and sin: as patience and submission
under afflictions ; confessing of guilt ; acts of

56 THE DOCTRINE OP

repentance, and of faith in the merits of Jesus
Christ ; relieving the necessities of the poor, forgiv-
ing wrongs and injuries, and many other such like.
Now the duties of the former sort, which are required
of us, were likewise required of Adam; and his con-
tinuance in them would have been his justification :
but not the duties of the latter sort; for a state of in-
nocence and perfection excludes all such duties,
because it excludes all that imperfection and guilt,
upon the account of which alone such duties are
become necessary. Adam had the innate radical
power to do them, but no occasion to exercise it.

3. Adam, in innocency, had a power to do what-
soever the law or the God of nature did require ;
and, by this his perfect obedience, to have pre-
served the righteousness of his first estate, and his
undoubted right unto that life which was promised.

God is so just and merciful, that he lays no
commands upon his creatures to any thing that is
impossible, unless it be made so by an impotency
wilfully contracted. God may, indeed, justly
require that from us, which is now beyond out?
power to perform ; as, the perfect fulfilling of his
law ; and that, because it was once possible for us
in our representative. And if we have lost our
power of obeying, that does not prejudice God's
right of commanding; any more than the inability
of a voluntary bankrupt dischargeth his obligation
to his creditors. In the state of innocence, God
suited the power of his creature to the law which
he intended to give him; and made his obligation
to duty commensurate with his ability to per-
form it.

4. That obedience, which was the condition of
the covenant of works, was to be performed by
Adam in his own person, and not by a surety or

THE TWO COVENANTS. 57

undertaker; and, therefore, the covenant of works
hath no mediator.

And this is the great, yea, for ought I can see,
the only real difference between the covenant of
works and the covenant of grace. They both require
the same obedience and righteousness to justify
men : only, the covenant of grace allows it to be
the righteousness of another ; but the covenant of
works requires that it be wrought out by the man
himself. It is true, we live by doing this, as well
as Adam; but we do it by our Surety, not in our
own persons. And hence we may learn what cove-
nant it was, that Christ, the second Adam, was
made under. It was strictly the covenant of works
of personal righteousness ; the same that God en-
tered into with Adam: and, therefore, he is called
by the apostle the second Adam ; because, the first
Adam failing in his undertaking, he rose up in his
stead to be our federal head and representative;
and, seeing the first did not rightly manage the
trust deposited, Christ took the whole affair out of
his hands, and hath perfectly, fully, and faithfully
transacted it.

We have thus seen, both the promise and the
condition of the covenant.

Third. Our next inquiry should be concerning
the persons with whom it was first made, and by
whom it was first broken.

1. But before I come to that, it may not be
impertinent to resolve a query that may arise upon
what hath been already said. And that is, Whether
the afflictions and temporal evils that believers
suffer in this life be not inflicted on them by virtue
of the curse and threatening of the covenant of
works : " In the day that thou eatest thereof thou
shalt die," and, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die."

58 THE DOCTRINE 0*'

For the curse of dying comprehends in it, not only-
temporal death itself, but all other miseries and
troubles that we undergo in this present life. And,
indeed- \ is worth tne inquiry, whether the afflic-
tions anc sufferings of true believers be properly
punishments or not.

To resolve this, we must know that God hath
two ends respecting himself, for which he brings
any evil upon men. The one is, the manifestation
of his holiness ; the other is, the satisfaction of his
justice. And, accordingly, as any affliction tends
to these, so, it is either properly a punishment, or
barely a chastisement and correction. If God
intend by the affliction to satisfy his justice, then it
is properly a punishment, and flows from the curse
and threatening of the covenant ; but, if God
intend thereby only to glorify and manifest his
holiness, then it is not a proper punishment, neither
hath it any thing of the rancour and venom of the
curse in it ; but it is only a fatherly correction,
proceeding from love and mercy.

But,

(1.) The afflictions and outward evils that true
christians suffer are inflicted by God upon them,
to the end that he might manifest his purity and
holiness.

Indeed, there are many gracious ends respecting
believers themselves wherefore God doth afflict
them ; as, to exercise their graces, to keep them
humble and dependent, to starve their lusts, to
wean them from the world, and to fit them for a
better. But the great end respecting God himself
is, that, by these afflictions they might know and
see how holy a God they have to deal with ; who
doth so perfectly hate sin, that he will follow it with
chastisements wheresoever it be found. Though the

THE TWO COVENANTS. 59

sin be pardoned, though the sinner be beloved, yet
God will afflict him ; not, indeed, to satisfy his
justice, for that is done for him by Jesus Christ, but
to satisfy his holiness, and vindicate the honour of
his purity in the world, and himself, too, from con-
tempt, when those who will presume to offend shall
certainly smart for it, 2 Sam. xii. 13, 14.

(2.) The afflictions and evils that believers suffer
are not inflicted by God, that thereby he might
satisfy his justice upon them ; and, therefore, they
are not from the curse of the law, nor properly
punishments for their sins.

Punishment always connotes* satisfaction for
transgressing the law. But this satisfaction to
Divine justice is not to be wrought out by believers
themselves, and therefore whatsoever they suffer is
not strictly punishment. Christ hath fully satisfied
all the demands of justice, and therefore no farther
satisfaction is expected from them, since that could
not be consistent with the rules and measures of
justice, to punish both the Surety and principal too.
The curse of the law poured all its poison into
Christ, and there is not one drop of it that falls
besides upon believers : " Christ hath redeemed us
from the curse of the law, being made a curse for
us," Gal. iii. 13. For that death, and all those evils
threatened in the covenant of works, are curses ;
not merely because they are grievous and afflicting,
but because inflicted on transgressors, in order to
the satisfaction of Divine justice upon them. And
therefore Christ is said to be accursed, and his death
to have been an accursed death, (" Cursed is every
one that hangeth on a tree,") not because he died,
nor because he died a most bitter, painful, and
shameful death ; but because he was ordained to
* Implies, betokens.

60 THE DOCTRINE OF

undergo this death, as a satisfaction to the justice
of God, for the sins of men. And, truly, should
God inflict those very evils which he now doth upon
believers, to the end that he might thereby raise
some satisfaction to his justice, though the evils
themselves would not be greater, nor more sharp
and painful, yet they would all be curses, and make
them too accursed creatures : for the true notion of
a curse, and of a punishment, consists not in the
quality or the measure of the evil suffered, but in
the inflicting of it as penal, and in order to the
satisfaction of justice.

Hence, therefore, with what calmness and sweet
peace may a true christian look upon all his afflic-
tions ! Though they be sore and heavy, and seem
to carry much wrath in them, yet they have nothing
of the curse. The sting was received, all of it, into
the body of Christ ; so that now the covenant of
works is disarmed to him; and he need not fear the
dreadful thunder of its threatenings, for the bolt is
already discharged upon another. Indeed, were it
God's intent to satisfy his justice by the evils which
he brings upon me, I might then tremble with hor-
ror and astonishment, and account every, the slight-
est suffering, a presage and pledge, of far greater
and eternal to come ; but if I have an interest in
the righteousness of Christ, justice is already satis-
fied, and the curse removed ; and all the sorrows
and afflictions which I suffer, are but the corrections
of a gracious Father, not the revenge of an angry
God. Am I pinched by poverty ? that is no curse ;
God doth not seek revenge upon me, but only keeps
me from the allurements to sin and vanity. Am I
afflicted with losses in my relations or estate ? that
is no curse ; God doth not thereby seek satisfaction
to his justice, but only takes these from me, that he

THE TWO COVENANTS. 61

might be all in all. Am I tormented with pain, and
weakened with diseases, and will these bring death
upon me? yet diseases and death itself are no
curses ; but only a necessary passage from life to life,
a bad step to Canaan, a short night between one
day and another. Revenging justice is satisfied ;
and, therefore, come what afflictions it shall please
God to try me with, they are all weak and weapon-
less, without sting, without curse in them.

But, most sad and miserable is the condition of
wicked men, whose infidelity (unbelief) excludes
them from having a right in the sufferings of Christ.
For there is not the least affliction that befalls
them, the least gripe of any pain, the least loss in
their estates, the most slight and inconsiderable
cross that is, but it comes upon them through the
curse of the law. God is, by these, beginning to
satisfy his justice upon them ; and sends these
to arrest and seize them. He is beginning to take
them by the throat, and to call upon them to pay
him what they owe. Every affliction is to them
but part of payment of that vast and endless sum
of plagues, which God will, most severely and to
the very utmost farthing, exact of them in hell.

And, so much, in answer to that query.

2. Let us now proceed to inquire who are the
persons with whom this covenant of works was at
first made, and then by whom it was broken.

(1.) But, in order to a clear and distinct resolu-
tion to this, I must first premise one or two things
most necessary to be known ; and which I shall
lay as the basis and foundation of my ensuing
discourse.

[1.] The first is this : that Adam may be consi-
dered 'aider a twofold capacity : — As a natural
root — As a federal head.

62 THE DOCTRINE OF

In the former respect, we were in him as in
our original : in the latter, as in our representa-
tive.

There is no difficulty at all in conceiving of
Adam as our natural root; for that is only in
regard of the traduction* of the same nature to all
his posterity.

As all parents are the natural root of their pos-
terity, so Adam was of all mankind, delivering his
nature to his children, which hath since been
handed down along from one generation to another,
even unto us.

But all the difficulty lies in opening how
Adam was our federal head, and what it signifies
to be so.

A federal head is a common representative, or
public person ; a person, as it were, dilated into
many; or many persons contracted into one,
appointed to stand in the stead of others : so that
what he doth, as acting in that public capacity, is
as valid in law, to all intents and purposes, as if
those, whom he represents, had in their own per-
sons done it. This is a federal head, surety, or
representative.

Now, such a representative is supposed to have
a power to oblige those, for whom he appears, to
any agreement or compact whatsoever, as though
they themselves had personally entered into it.

And this power, that one man hath to oblige
and bind another, may arise two ways : — From a
voluntary delegation. From a natural, or, at
least, a legal or acquired right, that the one hath
over the other.

A representative by delegation is one, to
whom those, whom he represents, have, by a free
* Handing down.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 63

and joint consent, given up their own power, and
invested him in it.

As, to use a known instance in the choice of a
parliament, the people give away their power to
those few select men whom they send ; each shire
to its knight, and each corporation to its burgess :
so that whatsoever these few do is, in law, not
only the act of those men, but of all the people in
the nation : what laws or taxes soever they impose
on those whom they represent, are not only from
them ; but, in a law sense, the people lay them
upon themselves. But Adam was not thus the
federal head or representative of mankind ; be-
cause, having not as then received our being, we
could not, by a free consent, choose him to trans-
act with God for us.

Therefore, there is in some a power to
oblige others, arising merely from the right that
the one hath over the other.

And this right is twofold: either natural, upon
the account of natural production ; or else legal
and acquired, upon the account of purchase and
redemption. For both he that begets, and he
that purchases and redeems another, hath a right
over him ; and, by that, may become his federal
head, and bind him to all just conditions ; dispos-
ing of his person and concerns, as he thinks fit
and expedient. Accordingly, the whole race of
mankind never had but two federal heads or gene-
ral representatives ; and they were the first and
the second Adam. The power, that Christ, the
second Adam, had to represent those for whom he
undertook, was founded upon a legal and acquired
right over them ; as being their Redeemer, who
had bought them to himself out of the hands of
justice, and therefore might dispose of them as he

64 THE DOCTRINE OF

pleased. But the power that the first Adam had
to be our representative, arose from a natural
right ; as being the common parent of all man-
kind, in whose loins we all lay, and from whom
we derived our being; and, upon that account,
he might justly oblige us, who owe ourselves to
him, as well as himself, to what terms soever God
should propound, and he accepted. And the
reason why we say, that Adam only was our repre-
sentative or federal head, and not our other inter-
mediate parents, from whom we sprung as well as
from him, is not, because other parents have not
the same power to covenant for and oblige their
children as he had, (for still they have as much
natural right over those that descend from them,)
but, because they are not so appointed and con-
stituted by God. Should God make a distinct
and different covenant with them, they would have
as much power to bind their posterity to the terms
of it, as Adam had to bind all mankind to the
covenant of works.

That is the first thing premised.

[2.] Because Adam was thus our federal head,
we are not to be considered as distinct from him ;
but, as one and the same person with him, enter-
ing into covenant with God.

As the parliament is to be considered as the
same with the whole body of the people, in all
things wherein they do represent them ; so Adam
and all mankind are to be considered as one and
the same person, in all things wherein he repre-
sents us. Now, our being thus one with Adam
doth not denote any real physical unity or one-
ness : but it must be understood in sensu forensi,
in " a judicial law sense." And this oneness with
him, in a law sense, (which is a term frequently

THE TWO COVENANTS. 65

used, and therefore it might help us to have it
expounded,) signifies nothing else but that there is
a real foundation laid for the law justly to reward
or punish us, upon Adam's obedience or disobedi-
ence, as if we were one and the same person with
him ; which foundation is the right he hath over
us, to oblige us to covenant conditions.

(2.) These things thus premised, which are of
great moment in the doctrine of the covenants,
Take these two particulars :
[1.] That the covenant of works was not made
with Adam, considered in his private and personal
capacity; but as a public person, and a federal
head : and, therefore, it was made with us as well
as with him ; yea, with us in him.

He was not a single person, but a whole world,
wrapt and folded up together in one : so that all,
who have since sprung from him, are, in respect of
the covenant, but one Adam unravelled and drawn
out at length. What the apostle saith of Levi,
Heb. vii. 9, 10. "Levi — paid tithes in Abraham;
for he was yet in the loins of his father, when
Melchisedec met him ;" I may say in this case :
we all entered into covenant at the very, beginning
of the world ; for we were then in the loins of our
father Adam, when that covenant was made. So
that, when we consider either Adam or ourselves
with relation to this covenant, we must so mould
our apprehensions, as if all we were Adam, and
Adam all of us : for, though we then lay so deep
hid in our causes, and the small principles of our
Deings, yet the covenant took hold of us, and
jound us, either to the obedience which Adam
promised both for himself and us, or to the penalty
which he exposed both himself and us unto. Yet,
still, our covenanting in Adam must be understood

l 2

66 THE DOCTRINE OF

in a law sense : for it is utterly impossible that we
should personally and actually enter into covenant
before we were : but the meaning is only this, that
the covenant, which God made with Adam, doth
as lawfully and strongly bind us to obedience, and
in case of failure to punishment, as it did him ;
because God made this covenant with him, con-
sidered not personally but representatively, he
having a power to indent* for his posterity, from
the natural right he had over them as their com-
mon parent. And yet, possibly, it may be long
enough disputed, without hopes of a certain reso-
lution, whether, when God made this covenant
with Adam, he then knew himself to be a public
person, and to stand as the representative of all
mankind. Probable it is, that, this affair being of
such vast and general concernment, some such
apprehensions might be impressed upon him by
God, either through natural instinct or Divine reve-
lation : and, if so, the more inexcusable was his
fault, that, knowing himself entrusted with no less
a stock than the happiness of all his race, he
should so wilfully sin, and thereby ruin both him-
self and them.

[2.] In like manner, Adam brake this covenant,
not only as considered personally, but as he was a
common representative, and a public person; and,
therefore, not only he, but we, by eating of the
forbidden fruit, sinned and fell.

We are not to look upon Adam as alone in the
transgression ; but we ourselves were as deep in
it as he ; he, indeed, by personal consent to the
temptation, without which neither he nor we had
sinned ; but we, by a covenant or federal obligation
in him, our surety and representative. Every one
* To enter into contract.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 67

will readily confess, that he hath been, and still is,
a transgressor of the covenant of works ; that his
obedience falls infinitely short of the holiness and
perfection of the law ; but, that he should trans-
gress this covenant so many thousand years before
he was born, even in the infancy of the world,
that his hand should be lifted up against God in
that primitive rebellion ; this some deny, few
understand, and fewer lament. Yet what saith
the apostle, Rom. v. 12. 18, 19? In the 12th
verse, " By one man sin entered into the world,
and death by sin ; and so death passed upon all
men," ev <p "kcivteq fi/jLaprovy "for that all have
sinned," saith our translation ; " in whom all
have sinned," saith the margin; both are right ;
for indeed both carry but the same sense. So, in
ver. 18, " By the offence of one, judgment came
upon all men to condemnation ;" and ver. 19,
" By one man's disobedience, many were made
sinners." But how could many be made sinners
by the sin of one ? It is not by imitation only,
as the Pelagians held, maintaining that Adam's
sin had no more influence upon us, than the power
that a bad example hath to sway that will to evil
that is not necessarily confirmed in good : but this
cannot be, because death is here said to reign over
those who never " sinned after the similitude of
Adam's transgression.," ver. 14, that is, over in-
fants, for they also die in whom the example of
Adam could never work any propension to dis-
obedience; and, certainly, were there nothing else
in Adam's sin to make men sinners, but only the
setting of an ill example before them, I can see no
reason why the example of his penitence and after
obedience should not as effectually excite us to
virtue, as that of his disobedience to sin :

68 THE DOCTRINE OF

especially, methinks, the examples of the miseries
and wretchedness that sin hath brought upon Adam
and upon his posterity, might much more deter
them, than the examples of vice, if there were no
corruption in their nature, allure them. It is not
therefore by example only, that mankind are made
sinners through the disobedience of one ; but we
became sinners by his disobedience, because in
him we ourselves sinned and disobeyed : not, in-
deed, actually, for so we were not in him ; but
forensically and in a law sense, he being our re-
presentative and federal head, and God looking
upon what he did as equivalent to the personal
deed of all mankind ; which imputation was built
upon most just and righteous grounds, because
Adam, being our first parent, had a natural right
over us, and might bind all his posterity to the
terms of any covenant that God should be pleased
to make with him, and which might have been so
much to their advantage.

And thus I hope these two things are sufficiently
cleared, which are of great use and necessity to
our right understanding the doctrine of the cove-
nants ; with whom the covenant of works was
made, and by whom it was broken.

That many of these things are abstruse and
difficult, I cannot deny; but that any of them are
vain and frivolous, I do. It is a most ignorant and
weak excuse of many, who perhaps may be well-
meaning people, that these things are too high
speculations for them to search into ; that their
eternal salvation may be secured well enough,
though tVey know not such obscure points as these
are, so lot'.g as they conscientiously practise those
obvious truths and express duties which they know.
I will not, I dare not deny, but men may be safe

THE TWO COVENANTS. 69

in not knowing what they cannot attain. But, if
they pretend this for a shelter of slothful and
affected ignorance, let them consider, that many
of the great and precious truths of the gospel are
delivered obscurely; not to excuse us from, but
on purpose to engage us to a diligent search and
study of them. If these things were not expedient
to be known, why should the holy scripture so
abound with them ? The epistles of St. Paul are
full of these profound mysteries, which he wrote
to the churches in common, and every member of
them : these were read in public assemblies ; and
it concerned all the people to hearken to them,
and consider of them : and if the pressing only of
practical duties of Christianity had been sufficient,
most part of the apostle's writings had been need-
less and superfluous. It is true, we cannot deter-
mine what is the minimum quod sic, that is con-
sistent with salvation; what is "the least degree,"
either of grace or knowledge, that may just serve
to bring a man to heaven ; but this we may say,
that it is a very ill sign, to drive the bargain so
hard with God ; to desire to be saved, at the least
charges and expenses possible. This I will boldly
say, that he, who despiseth a more high and
elevated knowledge of the mysteries of Chris-
tianity, where the means to attain it are afforded ;
though others who are destitute of those means
may arrive at heaven and happiness, yet I must
needs doubt whether ever he shall. To despise
evangelical truths, which do not so immediately
tend to practice, is no other than to impute a
trivialness to the infinite wisdom of God, who
hath revealed them, and so often and largely in-
sisted on them ; and to withdraw the chief part
of ourselves, whereby we most of all show

70 THE DOCTRINE OF

ourselves to be men, from his obedience, even our
understandings. Certainly we serve God as well
by endeavouring to know his truth, as by endea-
vouring to obey his commands ; and he, who re-
solves to obey God when bidding him do this, but
not when he bids him understand this, serves him
more like an engine, than like a man.

From this, that hath been spoken, we may
borrow some light to discover to us the manner how
we are all become partakers of original sin, through
the violation of this first covenant of works.

Many are the disputes and great the difficulties
about this matter. Very much is said and written
upon this subject, to very little purpose; unless it
be to show us, how miserable the blindness and
ignorance of human nature is, which this sin hath
brought upon us. It would be a labour, as fruitless
as endless, to reckon up to you the great variety of
opinions herein. No one point of divinity hath been
more discussed and controverted than this; and
yet^ if I may be allowed so to judge, all, that ever
I have yet seen, hath either been false in the hypo-
thesis, or failed in the accommodation. Some deny
the imputation of guilt, and some the corruption of
nature; and, because they cannot comprehend the
way and manner of its conveyance, destroy original
sin itself. Others that grant both, yet puzzle
themselves and their readers with strange asser-
tions : some holding that the soul is propagated
from the parents even as the body is, and therefore
no wonder that a defiled soul should beget another
such: others, who hold the souls of men to be im-
mediately created by God, affirm that it contracts
pollution by being infused into a polluted body.
But, yet, the absurdities, that will follow upon all
xhese ways are so many so very gross and palpable,

THE TWO COVENANTS. 71

that such hypothesis, instead of satisfying, must
needs only disquiet and torment an inquisitive
mind. And yet, if, after all these differences and
disputes, the certainty of the truth in this matter
could be evidenced, it would more than recompense
the pains of all, and the errors of many who have
attempted it; for, though it be certain that niceties
in religion are not necessities; yet, if ever difficulty
and usefulness were conjoined together in any one
point, it is in this of original sin. I intend not to
handle the question at large ; but only briefly speak
to it, as a deduction and corollary from this doc-
trine of the covenants.

To enter into it, I must first premise a distinc-
tion or two concerning original sin ; and then lay
down some positions, from which it may be cleared
to you, that the true ground of our partaking of it
is only the covenant of works.

Original sin therefore is twofold :

The imputation of guilt,

The inhesion of corruption.

There is an imputation of guilt.

To impute guilt, is, to reckon a person a trans-
gressor of the law ; and therefore liable to the pun-
ishment threatened, whether he hath in his own per-
son transgressed the law or not And here lies a
great part of the difficulty, how we can become
guilty of another man's transgression, which we
never acted in, nor consented unto, and which was
committed some thousands of years before we were
born: and yet we shall be punished for it; and
that as justly as#if we had in our own persons
committed it.

Besides this imputation of guilt, there is in
original sin an inherent corruption of nature.

The former is by the schools called peccatum

72 THE DOCTRINE OP

originans:* and this, peccatum or iginatum ;f bar-
barously indeed, but yet significantly.

Inherent corruption of nature is commonly made
to consist of two parts.

The loss and privation of the image of God:
the clarityj of our understandings, the obedience of
our wills, the order of our affections, the perfect
harmony of the whole man in the subjection of
his inferior faculties to his superior, and all unto
God, being utterly lost and renounced ; so that
now we are become both unable and averse to
every thing that is good .

Besides this, it is commonly affirmed, that
there is some positive malignant quality in original
sin, namely, a violent propension and strong bent
of the whole man unto what is evil and sinful.

The former is called the privative, this latter the
positive part of original sin.

Yet I think, if it be well weighed, as there may
be insuperable difficulties in admitting such a posi-
tive corruption in our frame and composition, so
there is not any necessity to grant it. We need
not, I say, superadd any positive corruption in
original sin, to the privation of original righteous-
ness : for a mere privation of rectitude in an active
subject, will sufficiently solve all those phenomena
for which a positive corruption is pleaded. We
shall find man's nature wicked enough by his fall,
though there were no evil principles infused into
him (for from whence should they come ?) but only
holiness and righteousness taken from him : for,
the soul being a busy creature, act it must and
will : without grace and the image of God adorn-
ing and assisting it, it cannot act regularly nor
holily : its nature makes it active ; the loss of God's
* The originating sin. + Sin originated, X Brightness.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 73

image, which alone can raise the soul to act spirit-
ually, makes all its actions defective: and this
alone is sufficient to make all its actions corrupt
and sinful, without admitting any positive corrup-
tion. There needs no more to make a man halt,
that must walk, but to lame him ; and, certainly,
he that doth lame him, doth it, not by infusing
into him any habit or principle of lameness, but
only by destroying that strength and power which
before he had. So stands the case here : — we are
all lamed by the fall we took in Adam: our
natures are despoiled of their primitive integrity
and perfection, so that there needs not any positive
vicious habit implanted in our original, to make
our actions vicious and irregular ; but it is suffi-
cient, that we have lost those holy habits and prin-
ciples of righteousness and knowledge, which we
were at first endowed with, and which alone could
direct every action in ordine ad Deum, as the
schools speak, " with a reference to God," and his
honour and glory.

Thus then you see, original sin may be either the
guilt of the first transgression imputed to us, or the
corruption of nature inherent in us : to which cor-
ruption nothing more is required, than the loss of
God's image in an active subject.

It remains now to open, how this imputation
lies upon us, and this corruption cleaves unto us,
merely upon the account of the covenant of works ;
whereby we may clearly understand how it is that
we become partakers of original sin.

This I shall endeavour to do as to both branches.

As to the imputation of Adam's sin to us,
take these two particulars ; which will explain how
original sin, as to the guilt of it, lies upon us.

1. If Adam had not been our federal head, if

74 THE DOCTRINE OF

the covenant had not been made with us in him,
but had respected him alone, yet his sin might
have been justly so far imputed to us, as to sub-
ject us to temporal evils and punishments; because
of that relation which we bear unto him as our
natural head, and the common root from whence
we all sprang.

And the reason of this is, because God might
justly have punished the transgression of Adam,
in all his concerns, and in whatsoever was dear
unto him ; as his posterity would have been. So
that, to us, these evils would have been only a
simplex cruciatus, " only painful," because in-
flicted without any respect to our own sin; but, to
Adam, they had been penal, and properly punish-
ments. This I think may be made good by many
places of scripture, where God is set forth as
punishing some for the sins of others, who were
not their federal heads : *' Visiting the iniquities of
the fathers upon the children," Exod. xx. 5. " The
seed of evil-doers shall never be renowned. Pre-
pare slaughter for his children, for the iniquity of
their fathers," Isa. xiv. 20, 21 : and so, for the sin of
David, seventy thousand of his subjects were slain :
and yet those fathers were not the representatives
of their children, neither was David of his subjects.
But God might justly thus punish them in their re-
lations : for a father is punished, in the evils that
befall his children ; and a king, in those that befall
his subjects: and, though it be true that they have
evil enough of their own, to deserve these, yea, and
greater plagues ; yet, if they should be supposed
to be innocent and without sin, God might justly
thus afflict them, not indeed as punishing them,
but those that sinned, they being made only the
passive conveyors of those punishments to them.

THE TWO COVENANTS. /.">

I remember Plutarch gives this reason, in his
treatise " Of those who are late punished," why it
may be just to revenge the fathers' offences upon
the children : hQev hivov, saith he, «<T nnirov av
ekelvuv ovreg £XW(Tl TCl iK^lV(av- '* ^ is nothing
strange nor absurd, that, since they belong to
them, they should suffer what belongs to them."
So, then, though we had never sinned in Adam,
and the covenant made with him had never reached
us; yet God might justly have brought temporal
evils upon us, because of the relation we bear unto
him, as our natural head, and as we are parts of him.

That Adam's sin is imputed unto us, so far
as thereby to make us liable to eternal death and
damnation, results not from his being our natural,
but our federal head.

2. Adam's sin is imputed to our condemnation,
only because we covenanted in him, and not
merely because we descended from him. It is an
everlasting truth, " The soul that sinneth, it shall
die:" and, " The son shall not bear the iniquity of"
his " father," Ezek. xviii. 20. that is, the punish-
ment of his father's iniquity. So, " Every man
shall bear his own burden," Gal. vi. 5. . These ex-
pressions cannot be meant of temporal sufferings;
for I have already showed, that God may and doth
inflict them upon children, for the parents' sins :
but they are meant of future punishments, and
eternal death ; that none shall eternally perish for
his father's crimes, but only for his own. " But,"
you will say, " how then comes it to pass, that we
are liable to eternal death through the sin of
another, if so be the son shall not bear the iniquity
of his father, and only the soul that sinneth shall
die ?" I answer : This is still true, because we are
the souls that sinned; we, in Adam, who then rose

Vfl THE DOCTRINE OF

up our representative, in whom we covenanted with
God, and in whom we brake that covenant: and
therefore God inflicts death eternal upon his poste-
rity, not as a punishment for his sin, but for their
own ; for his sin was theirs, though not committed
personally by them, yet legally and judicially
charged upon them. The grounds of this I have
before mentioned, and therefore shall spare to en-
large upon it here: only take the sum and abstract
of it, in brief, thus : God was, at first, willing of
free grace to enter into covenant with Adam ; that,
if he would obey, he should live ; if he would dis-
obey, he should die the death : but, lest this grace
should be too narrow and stinted, if it had been
limited to Adam's own person only, therefore God
extends it to all mankind, and bids Adam stand
forth as the representative and surety of all his
posterity, and indent for them as well as for him-
self; which he might justly do, being the common
parent of mankind, and therefore having a natural
right to dispose of them, especially when in all
appearance and probability it would have proved
so incomparably to their advantage : he therefore
disobeying, the death threatened is as much due to
us, as to him ; it being, in law, not only his act,
but ours. And this is plainly the manner how we,
who live so many thousand years after, are made
liable to death by the first transgression. And,
therefore, Alvarez de Auxil. d. 44. n. 5. saith well,
" Proprie loquendo omnes Jilii Ada peccaverunt
oriyinaliler in co instanti, in quo Adam peccavit
actualiter /' that is, All the children of Adam are
not only then guilty of original sin when they are
first conceived or born, but " properly they sinned
originally in the same instant in which Adam
sinned actually" by eating the forbidden fruit ,

THE TWO COVENANTS. 7?

because they were then in Adam as in their repre-
sentative, and upon that account his transgression
was legally theirs.

And thus, I hope, I have made it clear, that, as
for that part of original sin which consists in the
imputation of the guilt of the first transgression, it
lies upon us merely from the covenant of works,
into which we entered with God in Adam.

There is another branch of original sin,
which consists in the corruption of our natures,
through the loss of the image of God. This also
had never seized on us, but by the covenant of works.

Many perplexed disputes there are, how we be-
came so totally depraved, and whence we derived
that corruption. I shall, as clearly as I can, lay
open to you the true and genuine grounds of it ;
which, in general, I affirm to be the violation of
the covenant of works.

To make this evident, consider these three par-
ticulars.

(1.) It must again be remembered, that the loss
of God's image, that is, of all that grace and holi-
ness wherewith our natures were primitively en-
dowed, is the true and only ground of all original
corruption and depravation.

Men's natures are not now become sinful, by
putting any thing into them to defile them; but
by taking something from them, which should
have preserved them holy. We have nothing
more in us by nature, than Adam had in hv
nocency : and, if it be said we have corruption in
us by nature, which he bad not, that is not to have
more, but less. He had the free power of obe-
dience; he had the perfect image of his Maker, in
all the divine qualities of knowledge and holiness,
which we have not, and are therefore said to be
c2

78 THE DOCTRINE OF

corrupt ; not as though there were in our original
any real positive qualities which were not in Adam,
but because he had those holy qualities which are
not in us. And,, therefore, when we say that Adam
communicated to his posterity a corrupted nature,
it must not be understood as if that nature which
we receive were infected with any vicious inclina-
tions or habits, which would sway and determine
our wills unto evil ; but the meaning is, that Adam
communicated to us a nature, which hath a power
to incline and act variously : but, withal, he did
not communicate to us the image of God, nor the
power of obedience,, which should make all its in-
clinations and actions holy and regular; and,
therefore, he communicated a nature corrupted,
because it was deprived of that grace which should
have kept it from sin.

That is the first particular.

(2.) The loss of this image of God was part of
that death threatened in the covenant of works.
" In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
surely die;" that is, thou shalt die a spiritual death,
as well as a temporal and eternal death.

And this spiritual death was the very despoiling
him of the image of God, and the habits and prin-
ciples of holiness: so that corruption of nature
seized upon Adam through the curse of the cove-
nant: God taking from him his image> and thereby
executing upon him this spiritual death literally,
even in the very day wherein he transgressed.

(3.) Adam being our federal head, and we dis-
obeying in him, God doth justly deprive us of this
image; that thereby also he might execute upon
us the spiritual death threatened in the covenant
of works, which covenant we brake in our repre-
sentative.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 79

And this I take to be the true account of the
corruption of our nature. It is a curse threatened,
in the covenant, to those that shall disobey ; and
inflicted upon us, because we were those that did
disobey, in Adam our federal head. We have our
beings delivered down to us : but that grace, which
should have enabled us to act without sin, is lost,
because the covenant of works threatened it should
be lost upon the first transgression. And, indeed,
this loss of God's image was the only death that
was immediately upon the fall inflicted : God did
not presently bring either temporal or eternal death
upon sinful Adam ; but he instantly brought spiri-
tual death upon him, as judging him, who had a
will to disobey, unworthy any longer to enjoy a
power to obey, nor would he have his image pro-
faned by being worn by a rebel and a malefactor.

And thus I have stated and answered that great
and much controverted question ; and think it to
be the clear, yea, indeed the only satisfactory way
to resolve how we are become originally sinners,
both by the imputation of guilt, and corruption of
nature.

And, yet, to add some more light and confirma-
tion to this, two particulars more are considerable.

Most probable it is, that, though Adam had
sinned, yet by that one act of disobedience he
would not utterly have lost the image of God, had
it not been taken away from him according to the
terms of the covenant of works. It was rather for-
feited by law, than destroyed by the contrariety of
sin.

So that, it is only upon the account of the cove-
nant, that both his nature and the nature of his
posterity were corrupted by that first transgression.
For it is very hard to conceive how Adam's sin,

#0 THE DOCTRINE OF

which was but one transient act, should formally
eat out and destroy the innate habit of grace in
hrm ; and therefore it did it meritoriously and fede-
rally. All grace depends necessarily upon the in-
fluence of the Spirit of God, both to preserve and
to actuate it ; and sin provoked God to withdraw
that influence, according as he had threatened to do*
and, hence it came to pass, that Adam's grace de>
cayed and perished, at once; and left him nothing
but mere nature, despoiled of those divine habits
and principles with which it was before endowed.

Though Adam had lost God's image him-
self, yet, if he had not been our federal head and
representative, I can see no reason but that we
should have been created with the perfection of
that image upon us, notwithstanding his sin and
transgression.

And, therefore, it is not merely our being born
of sinful Adam, nor of sinful parents, that must be
assigned as the true and principal cause why our
natures are corrupted; but because we are born of
that sinful Adam, who was our federal head, in
whom we covenanted, and in whom we ourselves
sinned and transgressed. Not our birth from him,
but our sinning in him, derives corruption upon us.
Though he had corrupted himself, yet, if he had
not been a public person, his corruption had not
infected our nature; any more than the sins of
intermediate parents do the natures of those who
descend from them. Nor doth Job contradict this
when he asks, chap. xiv. ver. 4. " Who can bring
a clean thing out of an unclean?" for there he
shows the impossibility of it, as the case now stands ;
not, how it might and would have been, if the whole
mass had not been federally corrupted in Adam.
And he, who seriously considers the most pure and

THE TWO COVENANTS. 81

immaculate conception of our blessed Saviour, will
be convinced of the truth of this : for, though he
descended from Adam as a natural root, yet he de-
scended not from him as a federal head ; the cove-
nant of works reaching only unto those, who were
to be his ordinary and common offspring; and,
therefore, though he partook of his nature, yet he
did not partake of his guilt and corruption.

And thus I have, as I could, stated this much
disputed and very difficult point of our partaking
of original sin, both as to the imputation of the
guilt of it, and the corruption of our nature by it ;
and have resolved all into the covenant of works,
into which we entered with God, in our first father
and common representative. The guilt of the pri-
mitive transgression lies upon us, because we both
covenanted, and brake that covenant in him ; so
that his sin is legally become ours : the corruption
of nature, through the loss of God's image, cleaveth
unto us, because this was part of the punishment
contained in the death threatened against those
that should violate and break that covenant.

Here then let us, with a silent awe upon our
souls, tremble at the hidden depths of God's justice.

It is the hardest task in the world, to bring
carnal reason to submit to and approve of the
equitableness of God's proceedings against us for
the sin of Adam.

" Is there any shadow of reason, that I should
be condemned for the sin of another, which I never
abetted, never consented to, never knew of ? a sin,
which was committed so many hundreds of ages
before ever I was born? If God be resolved I
shall perish, why doth he thus seem to circumvent
me ? why doth he use such ambages* and captious
* Idle circumlocutions.

82 THE DOCTRINE OF

circumstances of indicting me for Adam's sin,
which I never entered into ? Were it not far more
plain dealing, more direct proceeding, to cast me
into hell, and to justify it by the mere arbitrariness
of his will, and the irresistibleness of his power ?
Who can oppose the one, or prevail against the
other? But to implead me before justice, and to
urge equity in condemning me by a law made on
purpose to ensnare me, seems only the contrivance
of an almighty cruelty ; which yet might be safe
enough in its own force, without any such pretexts
and artifices."

Let every such blasphemous mouth be stopped,
and all flesh become guilty before the Lord. Tell
me, thou, who thus disputest against God's equity,
and complainest of his severity in this particular,
tell me, wouldst thou have been content, or thought
thyself well dealt with, to have been left out of the
covenant of works, and by name excepted, if Adam
had continued in his integrity? and, when all others
of mankind for whom he engaged had been crowned
with life and happiness, that thou alone shouldst
have no share in their blessedness, no title to it,
no plea for it, it being due only upon a covenant-
stipulation ? Wouldst not thou have thought that
God had dealt very hardly with thee, to omit, to
except thee only, for want of thy express consent ?
so that, though thou hadst obeyed, yet life should
not have been due to thee, nor couldst thou have
had any plea for it. For I have heretofore showed
you, that, if God had not entered into this cove-
nant with Adam, though he had observed all that
God commanded him, yet he could not challenge
life and happiness as a debt due to his obedience.
And, indeed, was God severe in threatening death
to the transgressors of his law, when yet he pro-

THE TWO COVENANTS. 83

mised life to those who observed it, which life he
was not bound to bestow ; and deposited this in
the hands of one, who might as easily have kept
as lost it, and whose interest did infinitely oblige
him to a punctual observance ? What more equit-
able, what more reasonable terms could be offered
than these, or more favourable to all mankind ?
Was this severity ? was this a design to entrap or
ensnare us ? Wouldst not thou thyself, hadst thou
then lived, have consented to this transaction ; and
have infinitely blessed God, for the mercy of the
condescension in making such a covenant, where-
by, if man should prove any other than a vast
gainer by it, it must be through the mere fault of
his own will ? Again, to vindicate the righteous-
ness of God in involving us in the guilt of the first
Adam, consider, Do you not think it is just with
God to save your souls from everlasting con-
demnation, through the merits of the second Adam,
Jesus Christ, imputed unto you ? and shall it not,
then, be as just with God, to account you liable
and obnoxious to it, through the sin of the first
Adam, imputed to you ? If the one be just because
of the covenant made between God the Father and
our blessed Saviour, this likewise is just because
of the covenant made between Adam and God :
you gave no more consent to that, than to this;
and Adam had as much power to appear and
undertake for you upon the account of production,
as Christ had upon the account of redemption :
only, such is the partiality of our self-love, that
we are ready to think that God is only then just,
when he is merciful ; and we reckon his dealings
with us equal, not by the strict measures of jus-
tice, but by our own successes, interests, and
advantages.

84 THE DOCTRINE OF

Let this, therefore, be an apology for God, to
vindicate his proceedings with us upon the account
of Adam's transgression. I had not so largely in-
sisted on it, but that there are secret heart-risings
in the very best, against the righteousness of God,
in this particular. Flesh and blood can hardly
brook it ; and, when it hath nothing left to reply,
yet still it will be murmuring and rebelling against
this truth. When the mouth of carnal reason is
stopped, yet then it will vent itself in carnal re-
pinings. But it becomes us to lay our hand upon
this mouth also, and to give God the glory of his
justice ; acknowledging it is most righteous, that
we should be actually and personally wretched,
who were federally disobedient and rebellious.

Many nice questions might be here pro-
pounded ; but because they are so, I shall only
propound them.

As : If Adam had continued in innocence for
some certain time, whether God would have so
confirmed him in grace as he hath done the holy
angels, that he should infallibly have persevered
in his original state. Whether, though Adam had
stood, his posterity might have sinned and fallen.
Whether, upon their fall, their posterity had been
guilty of original sin. Whether, if Adam had
stood some years in innocence, and afterwards had
sinned, his children born before his fall had been
involved in it. Whether, if Eve only had trans-
gressed, and not Adam by her persuasion, man-
kind had thereby been originally sinful. But
these things, being rather curious than necessary
speculations, which are not revealed to us in the
scriptures, I look upon it, as an unprofitable, so a
bold and rash undertaking, positively to determine
what might have been in such cases ; and think it

THE TWO COVENANTS. 85

safest, and most satisfactory to acquiesce in sober
and modest inquiries.

I shall, therefore, add no more for the doc-
trinal part of this covenant of works, but shall
close it up with some practical application.

1. Is it the tenor of the covenant of works,
that the man, which doth those things that the law
requires, he only shall live by them ? This then
may be for conviction to all the world.

It is a doctrine, that will strike through all self-
justiciaries, that trust to their own works and
righteousness to save them. Let the scripture tell
them ever so often, that there is none righteous,
no, not one ; that all have sinned, and are fallen
short of the glory of God : let God offer Christ
unto them ; Christ offer himself, his righteousness,
his sufferings, his obedience, and a life ready pur-
chased to their hands ; yet still they retreat ; and
appeal from him, to the works and righteousness
of the law, for justification.

Well, then, to the law they shall go. And, by
three demonstrations, I shall convince men, that
it is utterly impossible for them to be justified by the
law, or according to the terms of a covenant of works.

(1.) It is utterly impossible for them to act
answerably to the exact strictness and holiness of
the law ; and, if they fail in the least jot, read but
that terrible sentence pronounced against them,
" Cursed is every one, that continueth not in all
things, which are written in the book of the law, to
do them," Gal. iii. 10. This is the tenor of the law.

And dare you now maintain your plea, and
bring it to an issue with God? What can you
produce, that may justify you according to this
sentence ? Perhaps, among many thousand works
of darkness and of the devil, may stand up a few

86 THE DOCTRINE O*'

shattered prayers, a few faint wishes, a few pious
resolutions ; but the prayers heartless, the wishes
ineffectual, and the resolutions abortive ! Is this
the righteousness of the law, which Moses de-
scribes ? Is heaven grown so cheap, as to be set
to sale for this ? If you depend upon your works
for life, bring forth an angelical perfection. Can
you tell God, that you never had a thought in you,
that stepped awry ? not an imagination, tainted
with any the least vanity, impertinency, frivolous-
ness, not to say uncleanness, malice, blasphemy,
and atheism ? Can you say, that you never ut-
tered a word that so much as lisped contrary to
the law? that you never did an action, which
innocence itself might not own ? If not, as cer-
tainly there is no man that liveth and sinneth not,
you can expect nothing but condemnation accord-
ing to the sentence of the law, and the tenor of
the covenant of works, which thunders forth the
curse against every transgressor.

(2.) It is alike utterly impossible for you to
make any satisfaction to justice for the violation of
the law.

Thy own conscience, which tells thee thou hast
sinned, summonses thee before the great and
righteous Judge, who demands full satisfaction for
the violation of his laws, and thy offences com-
mitted against him. Suffering cannot satisfy,
unless it be in thy eternal damnation : and all,
that thou canst do, will not satisfy ; for all that
thou canst do, is but thy duty however. And yet,
without a full personal satisfaction, thou canst
expect no salvation, according to the covenant of
works. Yet, farther,

(3.) Could you perfectly obey, and in your own
persons meritoriously suffer, yet still there would

THE TWO COVENANTS. 87

be a flaw in your title ; for still there would be
original sin, which would keep you from obtaining
a legal righteousness.

It is true, the law saith, " Do this, and live ;"
but to whom doth it speak ? not to fallen, but to
innocent, upright man. It is not only a u Do
this" can save you ; but the law requires a " Be this,"
too. Now, can you pluck down the old building,
and cast out all the ruins and rubbish ? Can you,
in the very casting and moulding of your beings,
instamp upon them the image of God's purity and
holiness ? If these impossibilities may be achieved,
then justification by a covenant of works were not
a thing altogether desperate. But, whilst we have
original corruption, which will cause defects in
our obedience ; whilst we have defects in our
obedience, which will expose us to Divine justice ;
whilst we are utterly unable to satisfy that justice ;
so long we may conclude it altogether impossible
to be justified by a covenant of works. Instead
of finding life by it, we shall meet with nothing
but death and the curse.

2. This, therefore, might endear to us the un-
speakable love of God, in the inestimable gift of
his Son Jesus Christ ; by whom both this cove-
nant is fulfilled, and a better ratified for us.
Either obligation of the law was too much for us :
we could neither obey nor suffer : but He hath
performed both ; fulfilling the precept, and con-
quering the penalty; and both, by a free and
gracious imputation, are reckoned to our justifica-
tion, and the obtaining of eternal life.

3. This declares the desperate and remediless
estate of those who, by unbelief, refuse Jesus
Christ, and the redemption he hath purchased :
for they are still under the covenant of works ;

88 THE DOCTRINE OF

and shall have sentence pass upon them, accord-
ing to the tenor of that covenant.

There are but two covenants between God and
man. The one saith, " Do this, and live ;" the
other saith, " Believe, and live." Men are left
to their own choice, to which they will apply. If
they refuse the conditions of the latter, they must
perform the conditions of the former, or else
perish eternally. Now, every unbeliever doth
actually thrust Christ from him ; and reject that
great salvation which he hath purchased : they
will not have him to be their Lord and Saviour ;
and therefore God will certainly judge every such
wretch according to the strictest terms of the
covenant of works ; and then woe, everlasting woe
unto him. For every, the least transgression, of
the least tittle of the law will certainly, as God's
threatenings are true, be punished with eternal
death. And how many deaths and hells then must
be put together, and crowded into one, to make
up a just and fearful reward for him, who, scorn-
ing the way of salvation by believing, shall put
himself upon his trial by the covenant of works !
Whither will such an one fly ? what will be
his refuge ? Plead his innocence, he cannot :
conscience will take him by the throat, and tell
him loudly he lies. Plead the righteousness and
satisfaction of Jesus Christ, he cannot : he scorned
it, he rejected it ; and, therefore, cannot expect it
should ever appear for him, or avail him. There
is no hope, no remedy for such a wretch; but,
being thus cast and condemned by law, he must
for ever lie under the revenges of that wrath, which
it is impossible for him either to bear or to evade.

And thus much, concerning the covenant of
works.

THE TWO COVENANTS.

PART II.

Let us now proceed to consider and treat of the
Covenant of Grace, the sum and tenor of which
is delivered to us from the 6th to the 10th verse.

This Covenant of Grace is propounded to us,
upon a supposed impossibility of obtaining righte-
ousness and justification according to the terms of
the covenant of works.

And, lest it might seem as impossible to be
justified by this covenant, the apostle removes the
two great objections that lie in the way.

For, it may be argued, that the abode and
residence of Christ, the Son of God, who is to
work out this righteousness for us, is in the high-
est heavens ; and how then shall he be brought
down to earth, to fulfil the law in our stead ?

To this the apostle answers : " Say not in thine
heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? that is, to
bring Christ down from above." That care is
already taken ; and God, the eternal Son, hath
left those glorious mansions, to shroud and eclipse
himself in our vile flesh. He was born of a woman,
and made subject to the law, and hath wrought
out all righteousness for us; that, through his
obedience, sinners might be pardoned and jus-
tified.

But then, again, it might be objected, That

whosoever will appear to be our Surety, must not

only yield perfect obedience to the law of God,

but pay down his life to the justice of God for our

ii 2

90 THE DOCTRINE OF

offences : and if Christ thus die for us, how can
he then appear before God in our behalf, to plead
our cause, to justify and acquit us ? We cannot
be justified unless Christ die ; neither can we be
justified by a dead Christ : and who is there that
can raise this crucified and murdered Saviour to
life again, that we might obtain righteousness by
him ?

To this also the apostle answers : " Say not in
thine heart — Who shall descend into the deep ?"
that is, into the grave, where his body lay en-
tombed ; or into Hades, the place and receptacle
of separate souls: or, if you will, into both these
depths ; into Hades, to bring back the soul of
Christ to his body; and into the grave, to raise his
body with his soul, and to rescue him from the
power of death and corruption ? That work is
already done. He hath, by his almighty Spirit and
Godhead, broken asunder the bands of death, and
the bars of the grave, it being impossible that he
should be holden of it; and that, having dis-
charged the debt, he should any longer lie under
arrest and confinement.

And thus the apostle, as I conceive, answers
these two objections against the possibility of our
being justified by Christ, according to the terms of
the covenant of grace, taken from the grand im-
probability both of his incarnation and resurrec-
tion : how, being God, he should descend from
heaven, and become man ; and how, being man,
he should ascend out of the grave, and become a
fit Mediator between God and men. And, there-
fore, both these being done, though the righteous-
ness of the law be impossible, yet you need not
despair of a righteousness: the matter of your
justification is already wrought out : Christ, by his

THE TWO COVENANTS. 91

incarnation, hath subjected himself to all obedience
both of the precept and penalty of the covenant of
works ; and, by his resurrection and intercession,
will take care to secure the application of his
merits and righteousness unto you.

These two objections being thus removed, the
apostle proceeds on, in the eighth and ninth verses, to
give us the sum and tenor of the covenant of grace.

" What saith it 1 The word is nigh thee, even
in thy mouth, and in thy heart:" (expressions bor-
rowed from Moses concerning the delivery of his
law, Deut. xxx. 12. 14. which the apostle applies
here to the gospel of Christ) and tells us, that
" the word of faith, which we preach," is, " that,
if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus,
and shalt believe with thine heart that God hath
raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."
As if the apostle should have said, *■ God requires
no impossible thing for thy salvation. He doth
not bid thee pluck Christ from heaven, and thrust
him into a body. He doth not bid thee descend
into the bowels of the earth, and there rescue
Christ from the power of the grave. These are
not within the compass of thy ability; nor doth
God require for thy justification and salvation any
thing that is impossible to be done. No : but
' the word of righteousness * which we preach/
that is, the manner of obtaining righteousness
which we exhibit in the gospel, is no other than
what lieth in the heart and in the mouth. Thou
needest not go up to heaven, to bring Christ down
from thence ; nor down to the grave, to raise him
from the dead: these things are already done; and
thou needest go no farther than thy heart and thy
mouth for salvation. God hath placed the con-
ditions of it in them : that, if thou believest on

92 THE DOCTRINE OF

Christ in thy heart, and if thou confessest him
with thy mouth, thou shalt be saved.'

This, I suppose, is the clear scope and intent of
the apostle in these verses.

Yet here we must also take notice,

1. That, though the apostle seems here to make
the believing that Christ is raised from the dead
to be a true, saving, and justifying faith ; yet it
must not be so understood, as if only a dogmatical
belief of this proposition — That Christ is risen from
the dead, were faith sufficient to justify us; but, as
it is common in holy scripture, by mentioning one
principal object of faith, to mean the whole extent
of it, so here, though only the resurrection of
Christ be mentioned, yet all his merits and right-
eousness are intended, which, by virtue of his being
raised from the dead, may by faith be effectually
applied unto the soul. So that, " If thou believest
that Christ is raised from the dead," is no other
than, " If thou believest on Christ, who is raised
from the dead." And so the apostle himself ex-
pounds it, ver. II. " Whosoever believeth on him
shall not be ashamed." For saving faith is not
only a mere assent to any proposition concern-
ing Christ, whether it be his Deity, his incarnation,
his death, his resurrection, or the like; for, so,
" the devils believe, and tremble," and many
thousand wicked nominal christians do believe that
God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, and all the
other articles of their creed; but yet, this specula-
tive faith, being overborne by their impious and
unholy practices, will not at all avail to their justi-
fication ; but, if thou so believest that Christ is
risen from the dead, that this thy faith hath an
effectual influence to raise thee from the death of
sin to the life of righteousness, thou shalt be saved.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 93

2. What the apostle speaks here, of confessing
Christ with our mouths, must not be restrained only
to a verbal confession of him ; but it comprehends,
likewise, our glorifying him by the whole course of
our professed obedience and subjection to him.

So that, in these two, is comprehended the whole
sum of christian religion — faith, and obedience;
the inward affections of the heart, and the outward
actions of the life.

In brief— all that here tne apostle speaks fails
into this, " If thou wilt believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, and if thou wilt sincerely obey him, thou
shalt be saved :" and this he gives as the sum and
tenor of the righteousness of faith, and the covenant
of grace.

First. That we may aright conceive of the cove-
nant of grace from the very first ground and foun-
dation of it,. I shall lead you through these follow-
ing positions.

1. God having, in his eternal decree of per-
mitting it, foreseen the fall of man, and thereby the
breach and violation of the covenant of works, gra-
ciously resolved not to proceed against all mankind
according to the demerits of their transgression, in
the execution of that death upon them which the
covenant threatened; but to propound another
covenant unto them upon better terms, which who-
soever would perform, should obtain life thereby :
purposing, likewise, by his grace and Spirit so effec-
tually to work upon the hearts of some, that they
should perform the conditions of this second cove-
nant, and thereby obtain everlasting life.

God would have some of all those creatures, whom
he made capable of enjoying him, to be brought to
that most blessed and happy fruition. The angels
did not all fall, but multitudes of them kept their

94 THE DOCTRINE OF

first estate and glory ; and, therefore, as some think,
God never found out a means to reconcile those
that fell. But all mankind at once sinned, and fell
short of the glory of God : and, therefore, lest they
should all perish, and a whole species of rational
creatures, who were made fit to behold and enjoy
him in glory, should for ever be cut off from his
presence and the beatific vision, he resolves, that,
as the fall of all was by the terms of one covenant,
so the restoration of some should be by and accord-
ing to the terms of another. And, thus, in reference
to this eternal purpose, the apostle calls it " eternal
life," which was " promised before the world began,"
Tit. i. 2. and also, 2 Tim. i. 9. he speaks of the " pur-
pose" and " grace" of God, " which was given us
in Christ Jesus, before the world began."

Now, in this design of entering into another cove-
nant, besides the restoring of fallen man, God the
Father intended the glorifying of himself and his
Son Jesus Christ.

(1.) He intended to glorify himself, his mani-
fold wisdom and unsearchable counsel, in finding
out a means to reconcile justice and mercy, to
punish the sin, and yet to pardon the sinner: his
righteousness; in the remission of sins through the
propitiation of Christ, Rom. iii. 25. " God hath set"
him " forth to be a propitiation, through faith in
his blood; to declare his righteousness for the re-
mission of sins:" and, likewise, his rich and abun-
dant grace ; in giving his Son to die for rebels ; to
make him a curse, that we might receive the bless-
ing; and to make him sin for us, that we might be
made the righteousness of God through him.

(2.) By the covenant of grace, the glory of Christ
Jesus was also designed: God appointing him to
be the Mediator of this new covenant: and thereby

THE TWO COVENANTS. 95

giving a glorious occasion to demonstrate the riches
of his free love, in subjecting his life to such a
death, and his glory to such a shame ; and all to
purchase such vile and worthless creatures as we
are, and to redeem us from eternal woe and misery :
to exalt likewise the glory of his almighty power;
in supporting the human nature under the vast load
of the wrath of God, and the curse of the law : the
glory of his uncontrollable sovereignty, in volunta-
rily laying down his life and taking it up again ; of
his complete and all-sufficient sacrifice, in fully
perfecting all those who are sanctified; of his effec-
tual intercession, in the gifts and graces of his Holy
Spirit impetrated* thereby.

These may be some of the reasons, why, after
the foresight of the breach of the covenant of works,
God purposed from all eternity to establish another
and a better covenant with mankind.

2. Upon this purpose of God to abrogate the
covenant of works, that it should no longer be the
standing rule according to which he would proceed
with all mankind, there came in the room and stead
thereof a twofold covenant:

A Covenant of Redemption.

A Covenant of Reconciliation.

The covenant of redemption was everlasting,
from before all time; made only between God the
Father, and Jesus Christ.

The covenant of reconciliation was temporal;
made between God and men through Christ, and
took place immediately after the fall : of which the
first exhibition was that promise, that the Seed of
the woman should break the serpent's head.

The covenant of redemption, or of the mediator-
ship, was made only between the Father and the Son
* Obtained by prayer.

96 THE DOCTRINE OF

before the foundations of the world were laid. And,
though it was entirely for man's infinite benefit and
advantage, yet he was taken into it as a party. The
form of this eternal covenant we have at large
expressed, Isa. liii. from the 10th verse to the end:
** When thou shalt make his soul an offering for
sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days
— He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be
satisfied — He shall divide the spoil with the strong,
because he hath poured out his soul unto death ;"
and, " by his knowledge," that is, by the knowledge
and faith of him, he shall " justify many." All
which is spoken of the reward, which God would
give unto Christ, for his great and arduous under-
taking of the redemption of fallen mankind.
From this covenant of redemption do flow,
(1.) Many of those relations, wherein God the
Father and the Son do stand mutually engaged
each to other, which are founded upon Christ's
undertaking our redemption.

As, from this eternal covenant it is, that Christ
Jesus is related unto God, as a surety to a creditor:
and, therefore, he is called " the Surety of a better
testament," Heb. vii. 22. Hence, likewise,
he bears the relation of an Advocate to a judge,
1 John "ii. 1 : " We have an Advocate with the
Father." Hence, also, ariseth the relation of a ser-
vant to his lord and master: Isa. xlii. 1. "Behold
my Servant, whom I uphold :" and, again, " It is
a light thing that thou shouldest be my Servant, to
raise up the tribes of Jacob" only — " I will also give
thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest
be my salvation unto the end of the earth," Isa.
xlix. 6 : and so, again, Christ is called God's " Ser-
vant, the Branch," Zech. iii. 8. Hence, likewise,
it is, that, although Christ, considered essentially

THE TWO COVENANTS. 97

as God, be equal in glory and dignity, yea the
same with the Father, " I and my Father are one,"
John x. 30. yet, because he entered into this
covenant of redemption, engaging himself to be a
Mediator and his Father's Servant, in accomplishing
the salvation of his elect, therefore he may be said
to be inferior to the Father. In which sense, he
himself tells us, " My Father is greater than I,"
John xiv. 28. It is no contradiction, for Christ
to be equal with God, and yet inferior to the Father.
Consider him personally, as the eternal Son of God,
and the second hypostasis in the ever-blessed Tri-
nity; so, he " thought it not robbery to be equal
with God," Phil. ii. 6. Consider him federally, as
bound by this covenant of redemption to serve God,
by " bringing many sons unto glory ;" so, he
thought it no debasement to be inferior unto God.
And, therefore, whatsoever you meet with in scrip-
ture, implying any inequality and disproportion
between God the Father and his Son Jesus Christ
must still be understood with reference to this cove-
nant of redemption. For, essentially, they are
one and the same God ; personally, they differ in
order and original; but, immediately, they differ
in authority and subjection, and all the economy
of man's salvation, designed by the one, and accom-
plished by the other.

(2.) From this covenant of redemption flows
the mutual stipulation or agreement between the
Father and the Son, upon terms and conditions
concerning man's salvation; or rather, indeed, it
formally consists in it.

Christ was originally free; and no way obliged
to undertake this great and hard service, of recon-
ciling God and man together. He well knew what
it would cost him to perform it; all the contempt
i

98 THE DOCTRINE OF

and reproach, the agonies and conflict, the bitter
pains and cruel torments, which he must suffer to
accomplish it. And, though the Deity was secure
in its own impassibility; yet he knew that the strict
union between his human nature and Divine would,
by a communication of properties, make it the
humiliation and abasement of God, the sufferings
and the blood of God. And, therefore, God the
Father makes Christ many promises, that, if he
would undertake this work, he should " see his
seed, prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord
should prosper in his hand;" as in the forecited Isa.
liii: yea, that all principality and dominion, bofch
in heaven and earth, should be consigned over
unto him; and that he should be the Head, King,
and Governor, both of his church and of the whole
world. And, therefore, when he had fulfilled and
accomplished this great work, he tells his disciples,
" All power is given unto me," both " in heaven and
in earth," Matt, xxviii. 18.; and, Eph. i. 20— 22.
the Father " set" Christ " at his own right hand —
far above all principality, and power, and might,
and dominion, and every name that is named, not
only in this world, but also in" the world that " is
to come ; and hath put all things under his feet,
and" hath given him "to be Head over all things
to the church." Upon these articles and conditions
Christ accepts the work; and resolves to take upon
him the form of a servant, to be made under the
authority of the law, and to bear the curse of it,
and the whole load of his Father's wrath due unto
sin and sinners. " He shall bear their iniquities:
therefore will I divide him a portion with the great
and he shall divide the spoil with the strong ; because
he hath poured out his soul unto death," Isa. liii.
11, 12. And thus the covenant of redemption is,

THE TWO COVENANTS. 99

from all eternity, agreed and perfected between the
Father and Jesus Christ.

3. This undertaking and agreement of Christ in
eternity was as valid and effectual for procuring
all the good things of the covenant of grace, and
the making of them over unto believers, as his
actual performing of the terms afterwards in the
fulness of time.

Upon this lies the stress of our affirming the cove-
nant of grace to be exhibited before Christ's coming
into the world. For, had not Christ's undertaking
been as effectual as his actual fulfilling, this cove-
nant of grace could have been of no force till his
coming in the flesh and his dying upon the cross.
And therefore he was the Mediator of the new
covenant, to the Jewish believers, under the admi-
nistration of the law; to the patriarchs, before the
promulgation of the law; yea, to Adam himself,
instantly upon his fall: because the covenant of
redemption, that he had entered into with his Father,
gave him present right and title to enter upon his
office, and to act as Mediator, upon the account of
his future sufferings. As a man, that purchaseth
an inheritance, may presently enter upon the pos-
session, though the day for the payment of the price
be not yet come : so Christ, upon the contract and
bargain made with the Father, of purchasing the
whole world to himself at the price of his death
and blood, entered presently upon his purchase,
though the day set for the payment of the price
was some thousand years after. And thus Christ
is called a " Lamb slain from the foundation of the
world," Rev. xiii. 8; though some, indeed, would
refer these words, " from the foundation of the
world," to the writing of the names, and not to the
slaying of the Lamb ; making the sense thus— whose

100 THE DOCTRINE OF

names were not written from the foundation of the
world, in the book of life of the Lamb slain : and
for this interpretation they allege, Rev. xvii. 8.
yet, certainly, this slaying of the Lamb from the
foundation of the world, may well be understood
concerning the death of Christ, either typically re-
presented in those sacrifices of lambs which Abel
offered in the beginning of the world, or else decreed
in God's purpose from all eternity, and thereupon
valid to procure redemption for believers in all
ages, even before his actual suffering of it.

These things I premise, that, in them, you might
see upon what foundation the whole transaction
between God and man stands, in entering into a
covenant of grace. That man is at all restored, can
be founded upon nothing but God's absolute purpose
of having " mercy on whom he will have mercy. "
That this restoring him to grace and favour, and
consequently to eternal life, should be by a cove-
nant of grace sealed and confirmed in the blood of
Christ, is founded only on the eternal covenant of
redemption made between the Father and the Son.
The covenant of reconciliation is built upon the
covenant of redemption ; the covenant between God
and man, on the covenant between God and Christ.

(1 .) Here, possibly, some, instead of glorify.ing
the infinite wisdom of God in thus laying the model
and platform of our salvation, may be apt to cavil
against the tediousness of the proceeding. " For,
might not God, by one act of sovereign mercy, have
pardoned our sins, and remitted the punishment,
though Christ had never died to satisfy justice?
Might he not have accepted the sinner to favour
and salvation, though Christ had never been sent
to work out a perfect righteousness for him ? What
needed then this long and troublesome method, of

TtfE TWO COVENANTS. 101

designing him from eternity to be a Mediator, of
appointing his own Son to so base a humiliation,
and so cursed a death ; since all that is now pur-
chased for us at so mighty a rate, might have been
conferred upon us by a free and absolute act of
mercy?" Thus, possibly, the thoughts of men
may work. But to this I answer,

[1.] It is saucy and unwarrantable presumption,
for us to dispute whether God could have saved us
otherwise; since it is infinite love and mercy, that
he will vouchsafe to save us any way. And, if so
be it were not simply necessary that Christ should
die to bring us to glory, this should the rather
engage us to admire and adore the supererogation
of the Divine love, which designed him primarily a
gift to men, as well as a sacrifice to God ; and sent
him into the world, not so much upon the necessity
of satisfying justice, as of demonstrating infinite
love and mercy, John iii. 16.

[2..] Whether God might, according to his abso^
lute pleasure, have saved us, without the satisfaction
of Christ, is not necessary for us to know ; since it
is clearly revealed in scripture, that this is the way
that God designed from all eternity ; and by which,
in the fulness of time, he accomplished our salva-
tion. Who can peremptorily determine what God
might or might not do, in this particular? Can we
set limits to his power, or bound his prerogative?
It should satisfy our inquiries, that this way of sal-
vation is attainable; and that God is resolved to
save us no other way than this. " There is none
other name under heaven, given among men, where-
by we must be saved," Acts iv. 12.

[3.] Yet, if any be further inquisitive, only out
of an awful reverence to search out the wonderful
mystery of his redemption, I assert that it is most
l 2

102 THE DOCTRINE OF

probable that God might, acording to his absolute
power and good pleasure, have saved fallen man-
kind, though Christ had never been appointed to
the work of redemption, nor any covenant of grace
been made with us in him. Nor doth this position
hold any correspondence with Socinianism; since
we absolutely maintain, that it is God's revealed
will and purpose to save none, but through the
satisfaction of Christ.

(2.) If it be said, that " no other way could be
consistent with God's justice; and that therefore
the apostle tells us, Rom. iii. 26. that Christ was
set forth as a propitiation, to declare the righteous-
ness of God, that he might be just, and the justifier
of those that believe : and how could God be just,
if he should pardon sin without a satisfaction ; and
by whom should this satisfaction be made, but by
Christ the Mediator?"

To this I answer, that the justice of God may be
considered — In its absolute nature, as an infinite
attribute and perfection of the Divine essence — As
to the external expressions of it in punitive acts,
taking vengeance on offenders.

If we take the justice of God in the former re-
spect, so it is essential to him, yea, the same with
him; and it is as blasphemous a contradiction, to
say that God can be, and yet not to be just; as to
say, that he may be, and yet not be holy, wise,
almighty, &c.

But, if we take the justice of God for the external
expressions of it in a vindicative way upon offenders,
I can see no contradiction nor absurdity, in affirm-
ing that God might, if he had so pleased, have par-
doned sinners without any satisfaction. If he pun-
ish without pardoning, he is just; and, if he should
have pardoned without punishing, still he had been

THE TWO COVENANTS. 103

just. God created this world, to declare his power,
wisdom, and goodness; yet still he had been essen-
tially almighty, wise, and good, if he had never
expressed these attributes in any effects of them.
So God punisheth sin, to declare and glorify his
justice : yet he would have been as essentially just,
had he remitted it without exacting any punish-
ment. And why should it be unjust with God, to
acquit a guilty person without punishment; seeing
it is not unjust with him, to assign an innocent per-
son, his own Son, to bear the punishment of the
guilty ? Certainty, there was no more natural neces-
sity, antecedent to the free determination of his
own will, to punish another, that he might show
mercy unto us, than there was, to show mercy to
another, only with a design to punish us: and,
therefore, there was no more need that God should
punish Christ, that he might pardon us, than there
was, that he should pardon Christ all the sins im-
puted to him, that he might justly punish us. For,
if punitive justice be natural to God, so also is
pardoning mercy. Yet I suppose none will deny,
that God might, without wrong to his nature, have
damned all men for sin, without affording pardon
to any of them : and there can be no reason ima-
gined, why it should be more natural to God to
punish, than to pardon ; unless we would make
him, as the Marcionites and Manichees of old did,
a scbvus et immitis Deus* Sin doth, indeed, na-
turally and necessarily deserve punishment; but it
doth not therefore follow, that God must, by the
necessity of his nature, punish it: for then it would
be as necessary for him to pardon, because the sin-
ner deserves it not; because a sinner, deserving
punishment, is as much the object of mercy, as of
* A cruel and remorseless God.

104 THE DOCTRINE OF

justice ; both being equally essential attributes of
the Divine nature.

The truth is, that though all the Divine perfec-
tions be natural and necessary to God, yet his will
governs the external expressions of them: omnipo-
tence, wisdom, justice, and mercy are in God
naturally, and not subject to the determination of
his will: so that it k not from his will that he
is almighty, all-wise, holy and righteous ; but
from his nature. But the outward expressions of
these are arbitrary, and subject to his will : omni-
potence is natural and essential unto God ; yet it
is his will that applies his power to such and such
effects: so, likewise, though it be natural and ne-
cessary that God be just; yet the particular expres-
sion and manifestation of his justice, in a vindicative
manner, is not necessary, but subject to the free
determination of his will. As God will have mercy
on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will
he hardens; so, he will have vengeance on whom
he will have vengeance,and whom he will he might
have pardoned, and that merely by the prerogative
of his will.

(3.) And if it be said, that " God, being a holy
God, must necessarily hate sin, and therefore
punish it — "

I answer, that, though God's holiness doth neces-
sarily infer his utmost hatred of sin, yet that hatred
of sin doth not necessarily infer his punishing of
sinners. For it must be acknowledged, that God
may hate sin, odio simplici, et nan redundanti in
personam: that is, " with a simple abhorrency and
detestation of it, yet not with any ireful effects
flowing from it upon the sinner." It is, indeed,
absolutely necessary, that sinners should deserve
punishment : this flows not from the will and con-

THE TWO COVENANTS. 105

stitution of God, but from the nature of the thing
itself. But, that they be actually punished accord-
ing to their deserts, depends wholly upon the deter-
mination of the Divine will.

That is the third position.

4. Whether this way of salvation by Christ were
simply and absolutely necessary, or not; yet, cer-
tain it is, that no other way could be so suited to
the advancement of God's glory as this ; and, there-
fore, it was most congruous, and morally necessary,
that our salvation should be wrought out by his
sufferings and satisfaction. For,

(1.) This is the most decent and becoming way,
that God could take to reconcile sinners unto
himself.

So the apostle says expressly, Heb. ii. 10. "For
it became Him, for whom are all things, and by
whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto
glory, to make the Captain of their salvation per-
fect through sufferings." It would not become the
great Majesty of heaven and earth, whose sovereign
authority was so heinously violated by such a vile
and base creature as man is, to receive him into his
love and favour without some reparation made unto
his honour. And, if there must intervene a satis-
faction, there is none who could make it but only
Jesus Christ.

(2.) No other way could so jointly glorify both
the mercy and the justice of God, as this of bring-
ing men to salvation by Christ.

If God had absolutely remitted punishment, and
accepted the sinner to life by his mere good plea-
sure, this indeed had been a glorious declaration
of his mercy, but justice had lain obscured. If
God had made a temporary punishment serve for
an expiation of sin, here indeed both justice and

106 THE DOCTRINE OF

mercy had been glorified; justice in punishing,
mercy in relaxing the eternity of the punishment:
but neither the one nor the other had been glorified
to the utmost extent of them. But, in this redemp-
tion by Christ, justice hath its full glory, in that
God takes vengeance on the sin to the very utter-
most : and yet mercy is likewise glorified to the
full ; for the sinner is, without his own sufferings,
pardoned, accepted, and saved. That none but
Christ could do this is evident, because no mere
creature could bear an infinite punishment so as to
eluctate and finish it, and no finite punishment
could satisfy an infinite justice : be must be a man,
that satisfies ; else satisfaction would not be made
in the same nature that sinned : he must be God,
likewise ; else human nature could not be sup-
ported from sinking under the infinite load of Divine
wrath: and, unless we would have either the Father
or the Holy Ghost to become incarnate, this work
of man's redemption must rest on Christ. And,
indeed, who so fit to become a Mediator between
God and man, as the middle Person in the God-
head ? Thus then we see how expedient and fit it
is, that our redemption should be accomplished by
Christ Jesus : and, therefore, because the Divine
wisdom takes that way which is most expedient, it
is, in a moral sense, necesssary that it should be by
him brought to pass ; though, simply and abso-
lutely, God might have laid another design for our
salvation. Potuit aliter fieri de potentid medici,
sed non potuit commodius aut doctius prceparari ut
esset medicina ceyroti* August. Semi. iii. de An-
nunt. Dom.

* By the power of the physician, it might be effected
otherwise ; but it could not be better or more wisely pre-
pared, that it may benefit the sick as a medicine.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 107

And this, certainly, may commend the infinite
love of God unto us ; since he would not go the
thriftiest way, in accomplishing our salvation. Al-
though it were not simply necessary, yet, if it be
more conducible to make the mercy of our redemp-
tion glorious, the Son of God must become the Son
of man, and the Son of man " a man of sorrows."
He gives his natural Son, to gain adopted ones.
He punisheth a righteous person, that he might
pardon the guilty. God spares nothing, he saves
nothing, that he might spare and save fallen man
in a way most adapted to glorify, both the severity of
his justice, and the riches of his grace and mercy.

I shall not any longer detain you with preli-
minary truths. You see upon what the covenant
of grace is grounded, namely, the covenant of re-
demption ; and how far forth it was necessary,
that Jesus Christ should be our Redeemer, and the
Mediator of this covenant of reconciliation.

Second. To come now more immediately to the
subject intended, we must know, that the covenant
of grace made by God with man, is twofold.

There is the absolute covenant of grace, and the
conditional.

indeed, if we lay stress upon the words, as some
do, there can be no such thing as an absolute
covenant ; because every covenant supposeth con-
ditions, and a mutual stipulation : but yet we
may be well contented with the impropriety of
-^ the word, so long as we use scripture language.

1. Frequent mention is made of this absolute
covenant; as, Jer. xxxii. 38 — 41 ; Ezek. xi. 17 — 20 :
but, most fully and clearly, Jer. xxxi. 33, 34.
"This shall be the covenant, that I will make
with the house of Israel ; After those days, saith the
Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts,

108 THE DOCTRINE OF

and write it in their hearts, and will be their God,
and they shall be my people :" which the apostle
quotes and transcribes, Heb. viii. 10.

It is not this absolute covenant, or promise, call
it which you will, that I intend to insist on ; and,
therefore, I shall only give you some brief remarks
concerning it, and so proceed to treat of the con-
ditional covenant.

(1.) That this absolute covenant is made only
to those, whom God foreknew according to his
eternal purpose ; but the conditional covenant is
made with all the world.

God hath promised a new heart, only to some :
but he promiseth life and salvation to all the
world, if they convert and believe. And hence it
follows, that the absolute covenant is fulfilled to
all with whom it is made : but the most part of
mankind fall short of obtaining the benefits of the
conditional covenant, because they wilfully fall
short of performing the conditions

(2.) The absolute covenant of grace is so called
because the mercies promised in it are not limited
nor astricted * to conditions.

For though, in the ordinary method of God's
sanctifying grace, a sedulous and conscientious use
of the means is necessary to our conversion, and
the making of a new heart and spirit in us ; yet
these means are not conditions, because God hath
not limited himself thereto. It is certain and in-
fallible, that no man shall ever attain salvation
without faith, repentance, and obedience ; but no
man can say it is impossible that any should
attain a new heart, faith, and conversion without
preparations and previous dispositions.

(3.) Faith is the very mercy itself promised in
* Confined.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 109

the absolute covenant : but it is only a condition
for obtaining the mercy promised in the condi-
tional covenant. .

In this, God promiseth salvation to all men, if
they will believe: in the other, he promiseth grace
to his elect, to enable them to believe. All the
benefits of the conditional covenant we receive by
our faith ; but our faith itself we receive by virtue
of the absolute covenant ; and therefore it follows,
by necessary consequence, that though no man
can plead the promise of the absolute covenant for
obtaining the gift of the first grace, yet likewise no
man can receive comfort by the conditional cove-
nant, till he be assured that the promise of the
absolute be performed to him.

(4,) In brief, the absolute covenant promiseth
the first grace of conversion to God : the condi-
tional promiseth life, if we be converted. The con-
ditional promiseth life,' if we believe : the absolute
promiseth faith whereby we may believe to the
saving of our souls.

And therefore it is called an absolute covenant,
because the first grace of conversion unto God
cannot be given upon conditions. It is indeed
commonly wrought in men by the right use of
means ; as, hearing the word, meditation, prayer,
&c. but these means are not conditions of grace,
because we have found, that, in some instances,
God hath not limited himself to them. And,
indeed, what is there, that can in reason be sup-
posed as a condition of God's bestowing the gift of
the first grace upon us ? Either it must be some
act of grace, or of mere nature : not of grace ; for
then the first grace would be already given : nor of
nature ; for then the grace would be given accord-
ing to works, which is the sum and upshot of
K

110 THE DOCTRINE OF

Pelagianism. Whence it follows, that the absolute
covenant, of giving grace and a new heart, is made
only to those who shall be saved ; but the condi-
tional covenant, of giving salvation upon faith and
obedience, is made with all the world, and we may
and ought to propound it to every creature, If thou
wilt believe, thou shalt be saved.

2. It is not the absolute, but the conditional
covenant that the apostle speaks of in the text.

For life and salvation are here promised upon
the terms and conditions of believing on Christ
with the heart, and confessing him with the mouth;
that is, of faith and obedience, as hath before been
explained : and, therefore it is called the condi-
tional covenant, because these conditions must be
first fulfilled on our part, before any engagement
can lie upon God to give us the salvation promised.

Here observe,

(1.) That the salvation, which the text mentions,
when it saith, "If thou belie vest in thy heart, and
confessest with thy mouth, thou shalt be saved,"
comprehends in it all the benefits of the covenant
of grace,

Not only glorification, which it doth most
signally denote; but also pardon, justification,
reconciliation, and adoption : all which are called
salvation, because they all tend thereunto, and
terminate in it.

(2.) Though conditions are required on our
part, yet the mercies of the covenant are promised
to us out of mere free grace.

For, " therefore," saith the apostle, are justifica-
tion and salvation " of faith, that" they " might be
of grace," Rom. iv. 16. For God's grace and free
mercy, in enabling us to believe and obey, and
thereupon saving us, is altogether as glorious, as if

THE TWO COVENANTS. Ill

he should save us without requiring faith and obe-
dience from us at all.

(3.) Though faith and obedience are the condi-
tions, which God requires for the obtaining of sal-
vation, yet these conditions are themselves as much
the free gift of God, as the salvation promised upon
them.

By whom they are required, by the same God
they are effectually wrought in the hearts of all
those who shall be saved. And, therefore, as
there is no absolute covenant, properly so called ;
so neither, in strictness of speech, is there any con-
ditional covenant between God and man : because
a condition, to which a promise is annexed, must,
in propriety, be somewhat of our own, and within
our own power; otherwise, the promise is but
equivalent to an absolute denial. But, the condi-
tions of the covenant of grace are not simply in our
power to work them in ourselves ; but to those, who
shall be heirs of salvation, they are made possible
by grace : to the rest, they were once possible ;
which power they have lost — nor is God bound to
repair it.

If it be said, " True : it is impossible for us to
believe& unless God enable us ; yet this doth not
prove that it is not in our own power to believe i
for without the assistance of God, and his influ-
ence, we cannot think, nor speak, nor move : " In
him," saith the apostle, " we live, and move, and
have our being ;" yet who is so unreasonable as to
say, that, because these are God's gifts, therefore
we do not perform them by our own power ? So,
likewise, though faith be the gift of God, yet it
may also be in the power ©f nature."

This is the refuge of some, to which they retire,
when they are forced by scripture evidence to

112 THE DOCTRINE OF

acknowledge that faith is the gift of God ; as if a
common providential influence were alike suffi-
cient, to enable men to believe, and to perform any
ordinary and natural action.

To this, therefore, I answer : That some actions
depend only upon the concurrence of common
providence ; others, upon the influence of special
grace. And this I apprehend to be the true differ-
ence between these two : that the former are
wrought in us by God, without the reluctance and
opposition of our natural faculties ; but the latter,
against the bent and bias of our natures, which are
now corrupted by the fall. And, therefore, we
may affirm, that the obedience, which Adam per-
formed during his continuance in the state of in-
nocence, was but a common work wrought in him
by God's common influence; but our faith, and the
same obedience in us, though it be far more im-
perfect, is from special grace : because, in him, it
was wrought suitably to the tendency of his nature ;
but, in us, contrary to all its appetites and inclina-
tions, which in this lapsed state of mankind are
wholly evil and corrupt. And thus much the
apostle intimates unto us concerning faith : " That
ye" might " know — what is the exceeding- ereat.-
ness of his power" towards us " who believe, ac-
cording to the working of his mighty power, which
he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from
the dead," Eph. i. 18—20: therefore was the
power, which God declared in raising Christ from
the dead, an extraordinary and special power, be-
cause it was contrary to the course of nature, and
far above the ability of any created agent to effect;
and such, saith he, is the power that worketh faith in
us. And so, again, Col. ii. 12. " Ye are risen with"
Christ, " through the faith of the operation of God,

THE TWO COVENANTS. 113

who hath raised him from the dead." By the faith
of the operation of God, we may rather understand
the faith of God's operation, (that is, which he
worketh and implanteth in us,) than our faith in
God's operation of raising Christ from the dead ; so
that the scope of the place is plainly this — As Christ
is raised, so are we raised with him by faith; which
faith is wrought in us by the same almighty opera-
tion that raised him from the grave, and therefore
wrought in us by the supernatural efficacy of Divine
grace. Hence all those places, which mention faith
to be the gift of God, must be understood not as
of a gift of course, and of common influence; but
of extraordinary power, and special influence. So
Phil. i. 29. " Unto you it is given — not only to be-
lieve— but also to suffer:" where, though it may
seem that to suffer for the name of Christ denotes
not any special work of God ; yet, to suffer from a
right principle and to a right end, to suffer with a
calm submission and a conquering patience, is not
less a gift and a special privilege bestowed upon us
by the special and supernatural grace of God, than
we assert faith itself to be. So, 2 Pet. i. I, 3. " To
them," who " have obtained like precious faith with
us, through the righteousness of God : according
as his Divine power hath given unto us all things
that pertain unto life and godliness." I omit Eph.
ii. 8. Ye are saved by " faith ; and that not of your-
selves; it is the gift of God;" because, though this
place be commonly produced to prove that faith is
God's gift, yet I suppose that the word gift refers
rather to salvation, than to faith: for so it must
needs be, according to grammatical construction :
Etc unawtrfievoi Sta ttjq Tri^etog kcu raro Qea dojpov ;
else it would not be tuto, but avrr) : so that the
words do of necessity carry it, that this expression,
k2

114 THE DOCTRINE OF

not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, must be
understood, that the salvation, which we obtain by
faith, is not of ourselves, but God's free gift.*

And thus you see that it is very well consistent,
for faith and obedience to be conditions on our part,
and gifts on God's.

Third. These things being premised, that which
I shall now pursue is, to open to you what con-
currence FAITH AND OBEDIENCE HAVE INTO

our justification and salvation. Which cer-
tainly is as difficult a point to be explained, as it is
necessary to be understood.

And, in order to this, I shall inquire into the
nature,

Of justification itself: what it is, and signifies.

Of justifying and saving faith.

Of that obedience, which the covenant of grace re '■■
quires from believers, asnecessary to salvation. And,

Lay down some positions, in answer to the ques-
tion.— And this I shall do with all the brevity and
perspicuity, that the subject will permit.

1. Justification, therefore, in the most general
and comprehensive notion of it, signifies the making
of a man just and righteous.

(I.) And this may be done two ways.

[1.] By making a real change in a man's nature,
through the infusion of the inherent qualities of
holiness and righteousness.

* " For by grace ye are saved through faith, and this affair
is not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." The relative
tovto, as Chandler observes, being in the neuter gender,
cannot stand for mang, faith, which is feminine ; but it has
the whole sentence which goes before, as its antecedent. To
show this, I have supplied to irpayna, this affair — namely,
your salvation through faith is not of yourselves j it is the
gift of God.— Macknight.

THE TWO COVENANTS. 115

[2.] By making a relative change in his state, in
respect of the sentence cf the law : that is, when
the law acquits and absolves a man from punish-
ment, whether he hath committed the fact or not.

The former may be termed a physical justifica-
tion; the latter, a legal. The former justification is
opposed to unholiness; the latter, to condemnation :
the one properly removes the filth ; the other, the
guilt of sin.

Now, when we speak of the justification of a sin-
ner before God, it must still be understood of justi-
fication in this latter sense, namely, as it signifies a
judicial absolution of a sinner from guilt and punish-
ment, according to a legal process, either at the
bar of God or of conscience.

And herein lies the great error of the papists in
the doctrine of justification, that they will not
understand it as a law phrase, and a relative trans-
action in the discharge of a sinner; but still take
it for a real change of a man's nature, by implant-
ing in him inherent principles of holiness. We
grant, indeed, that, in order of nature, sanctifica-
tion is before justification; for we are justified by
faith, which faith is one great part of our sanctifi-
cation; but, in respect of time, sanctification and
justification are together; for, in the very same in-
stant that we believe, we are justified. Yet justi-
fication is not the making of a man's person inhe-
rently just or holy: if it were, certainly the wise
man would not have said, " He that justifieth the
wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they
both are abomination to the Lord," Prov. xvii. 15.
That man certainly would not be an abomination to
the Lord, who should be serviceable to the implant-
ing habitual holiness in another; since Daniel tells
us, ch. xii. ver. 3, " They that turn many to

116 THE DOCTRINE OF

righteousness, shall shine as the stars for ever and
ever." Many differences might be assigned between
these two justifications; but the chief are these : that
man is the subject of the one, because holiness is
wrought in him; but he i& the object of the other,
for the judicial sentence of absolution is an act in
God terminated upon the creature : the one, is by
inherent grace; the other, by imputed righteous-
ness: the one, is gradual; the other, complete at
once : in brief, they differ as much as sanctifying
our nature differs from acquitting and absolving ouc
persons.

(2.), This justification doth always presuppose a
righteousness in the person justified : for God doth
not make a man inwardly righteous, because he
justifies him ; but therefore he justifies him, because
he is righteous.

The righteousness therefore, that a man must
have before he can be justified, is either,

[1.] A righteousness of innocency, whereby he
may plead the non-transgression of the law, and
that it was never violated by him. Or,

[2.] A righteousness of satisfaction ; whereby he
may plead, that, though the command were trans-
gressed, yet the penalty is borne, and the law
answered.

These two respect the avoiding of the punish-
ment threatened. Or,

[3.] A righteousness of obedience, which he
may plead for the obtaining of the good things pro-
mised; and this respects the reward propounded.

Now, accordingly as any man can produce any
of these righteousnesses, so shall he be justified.
Innocency cannot be pleaded ; for " all have sin-
ned, and come short of the glory of God :" neither
can we produce a personal satisfaction, nor a per-

THE TWO COVENANTS. 117

sonal obedience wrought out by ourselves : and,
therefore, our justification is either utterly impos-
sible for want of a righteousness, or else we must
be justified by the righteousness of another imputed
unto us.

(3.) Christ, therefore, as our Surety, hath wrought
out for us,

[1.] A righteousness of satisfaction, which, in
the eye and account of the law, is equivalent to
innocency. And, by this, we are freed from the
penalty threatened against our disobedience.

[2.] A righteousness of obedience, whereby we
may lay claim to the reward of eternal life.

I am now the briefer in these things, because I
have before opened them at large.

(4.) We, therefore, having this twofold right-
eousness given to justify us, our justification must
accordingly consist of two parts: — The pardon and
remission of our sins — Our acceptation unto eter-
nal life.

[1.]' Our justification consists in the pardon of
sin. And. this flows from the righteousness of
Christ's satisfaction imputed to us. For guilt is
nothing else but our obligation to punishment; and '
therefore pardon, being- the removal of guilt, must
needs remove our obligation to punishment. But
no man can be justly obliged to that punishment,
which he hath already satisfactorily undergone.
And, therefore, Christ having satisfactorily under-
gone the whole punishment that was due to us, and
God graciously accounting his satisfaction as ours,
it follows, that we lie under no obligation to pun-
ishment ; and are therefore, by the righteousness
of Christ's satisfaction, pardoned and justified, ran-
somed and delivered from bearing the penalty of
the law. It is true, a pardon and full satisfaction

118 THE DOCTRINE OP

are, in themselves, aawzara* and inconsistent: if a
man receive satisfaction for an injury done unto
him, he cannot be said to pardon and remit it: how
then can God be said to pardon sin, since his jus-
tice is fully satisfied by Christ? I answer— Those
very sins, which God doth pardon to the justified,
he did not pardon to Christ, when they were made
his by imputation: for his justice seized on him,
and demanded and received the utmost farthing of
all the debts he was surety for. And, therefore,
pardon of sin is indeed inconsistent with personal
satisfaction; but not with the satisfaction of an-
other imputed to us: if God had satisfied his justice
on us for our sins, then he could not have pardoned
them: but to satisfy his justice on another for our
sins, was at once to take punishment, and vouch-
safe pardon; to punish our Surety, and to pardon us.
That is, therefore, the first part of our justification,
namely, pardon of sin.

[2.] In justification, there is the imputation of
the active righteousness and obedience of Christ,
whereby we obtain aright and title, and are accepted,
unto eternal life.

He hath fulfilled all righteousness for us, and we
are " accepted in the Beloved." The law saith,
" Do this, and live;" and God accounts Christ's
doing it as ours. And, therefore, believers have as
just a claim to life, as Adam couM have had, had
he never transgressed. I shall not again discuss,
whether the right, which justification gives us to
eternal life, flows from Christ's righteousness of obe-
dience or of satisfaction : to me, it seems to be from
his obedience, and not so directly from his suffer-
ings ; for* though his sufferings be ours, yet the law

* JRepugnant,

THE TWO COVENANTS. 119

saith not, Suffer this, and live, but, " Do this, and
live;" as I observed before.

And if it be objected, that, by a man's not being
accounted a sinner, he must needs be accounted
righteous; by his not being liable to damnation, he
must needs have a right to salvation ; and, therefore,
that there is no more required unto justification,
than the imputation of Christ's satisfaction, which
carries with it both pardon and acceptation to
eternal life — To this I answer,

1. That pardon of sins, through the satisfaction
of Christ, doth give a man a negative righteousness :
that is, he is no longer accounted unrighteous, and
therefore not liable to punishment : but this gives
him no positive righteousness, which consists in a
conformity to the precepts of the law, by that active
obedience, which should entitle him to the pro-
mised reward.

2. Though damnation and salvation be contrary
states, so that he who is not liable to the one, hath
right to the other; yet they are not immediate con-
traries in their own nature, but only by Divine ap-
pointment and institution. And, therefore, though
a man should not be liable to damnation, yet his
right to salvation doth not naturally result from
this, but from God's appointment. It is true, if it
be not night, it must be day ; if the line be not
crooked, it must be straight; because those are
naturally opposite, and the one follows upon the
denial of the other. But it is not true, that a man
must either be liable to eternal death, or have a
right to eternal life, because these states are not
naturally and immediately opposite: for God,- after
he had pardoned a sinner, might justly annihilate
him; or otherwise dispose of him, without bestow-
ing upon him the eternal joys of heaven.

120 THE DOCTRINE OF

And, therefore, pardon of sin, and acceptation
unto eternal life, being two such distinct things,
may well be allowed to proceed from distinct causes :
the one, from the imputation of Christ's satisfaction ;
the other, from the imputation of his active obe-
dience.

(5.) So that you may take a brief description of
justification in these terms : it is a gracious act of
God, whereby, through the righteousness of Christ's
satisfaction imputed, he freely remits to the believ-
ing sinner the guilt and punishment of his sins;
and, through the righteousness of Christ's perfect
obedience imputed, he accounts him righteous, and
accepts him into love and favour, and unto eternal
life. This is justification : which is the very sum
and pith of the whole gospel, and the only end of
the covenant of grace. For, wherefore was there
such a covenant made with us through Christ, but,
as St. Paul tells us, Acts xiii. 39. that, " by him,
all that believe" might be " justified from all things
from which" they " could not be justified by the
law of Moses?"

Possibly some things may occur, in the opening
of this point, hard and rugged : and, though this
doctrine be in itself sweet and refreshing, and like
rivulets of water to the dry and parched earth; yet
this water must be smitten out of a rock. Rivers,
generally, the deeper they are, the more smoothly
do they flow: but these waters of the sanctuary are
of a quite different nature, and the deeper they are,
usually the more rough and the more troubled. But
beware you do not think every thing unnecessary,
that is not plain and obvious. It is the fault of
many christians, and a fault that deserves reproof,
to pass slightly over the great mysteries of religion
under a vilifying conceit which they have of them

THE TWO COVENANTS. 121

as unprofitable and unpracticable notions. They
do not find, when they sit under such discourses as
these, that their affections are so moved, their
hearts so warmed, their love so inflamed, their de-
sires made so spiritually vehement, their whole souls
so wrought upon and melted, as when threatenings
are thundered, duties pressed, promises applied,
and the more affecting part of religion dispensed ;
and so they go away, reckoning they have but lost
their time, and the opportunity of an ordinance.
For my part, it should be my importunate prayer,
that all christians were so taught of God, and built
up in the truths of the gospel, that there might
need no more instruction, but only admonition,
exhortation, reproof, comfort, and the more prac-
tical part of the ministerial work : but, when we
see so many old babes, so many monstrous and
misshapen christians, whose heads are the lowest
and most inferior part about them, still we find
abundant cause and need to inculcate truths, as
well as to raise desires ; that so their zeal and
affections may be built upon, and regulated accord-
ing to knowledge. Certainly, the more you know
of God and Christ, and the way of your salvation
through an imputed righteousness, the more will
you admire, adore, and advance Divine love and
wisdom, and the more humble and abase yourselves.
And, though some of these things be difficult, yet it
is very unworthy of a christian not to take some
pains to understand what God, if I may be allowed
so to speak, took so much pains to contrive.

2. Having thus shewed you what justification
is, the next thing propounded was, to open the
nature of justifying and saving faith, which is the
great condition of the covenant of grace.

And, indeed, of all gospel truths, it is most

122 THE DOCTRINE Of

necessary to have a clear and distinct knowledge
of this : for it is in vain to press men to this duty
of believing, as that whereon the whole weight of
their salvation depends, if yet they know not what
this grace of faith is, nor what it is to believe.
There is no one duty, that the gospel doth more
frequently command, or ministers inculcate, or
hath so great a stress laid upon it; and, yet,
because men know not what it is, and how they
must act it, this ignorance either discourageth
them into an utter neglect, or else misleads them
to exert other acts for saving faith, and to build
their hopes of heaven and eternal happiness upon
a wrong foundation.

And, truly, it is a point of some difficulty, pre-
cisely to state wherein lies the formal nature of
this grace. For,

(1.) Many formerly, and those of the highest
remark and eminency, have placed true faith in no
lower a degree than assurance ; or the secure per-
suasion of the pardon of their sins, the acceptation
of their persons, and their future salvation.

But this, as it is very sad and uncomfortable for
thousands of doubting and deserted souls, con-
cluding all those to fall short of grace, who fall
short of certainty, so hath it given the papists too
great advantage to insult over the doctrine of our
first reformers, as containing most absurd contra-
dictions. • Nor, indeed, can their argument be
possibly avoided or answered *. for, if pardon and
justification be obtained only by faith, and this
faith be only an assurance or persuasion that I am
pardoned and justified, then it will necessarily
follow, that I must believe I am pardoned and
justified, that I may be pardoned and justified ;
that is, I must believe I am pardoned and justi-

THE TWO COVENANTS. 123

fied, before I either am of ean be ; which is to
believe a lie. This will necessarily follow upon
limiting faith to assurance. Faith, therefore, . is
not assurance : but this doth sometimes crown and
reward a strong, vigorous, and heroic faith ; the
Spirit of God breaking in upon the soul with an
evidencing light, and scattering all that darkness
and those fears and doubts which before be-
clouded it.

(2.) Some, again, place faith only in an act of
affiance, or incumbence, upon the mercies of God
and the merits of Jesus Christ, reposing all our
hope for heaven and happiness in them alone.

This, indeed, must be allowed to be one act of
a true and saving faith, but cannot be the eutire
and adequate notion of it.

(3.) Others make faith to consist in an undoubt-
ing assent to the truths and promises of the gospel.
An assent, not only forced and compelled by the
mere evidence and light of the truths therein
delivered ; for so, the devils believe, and tremble ;
and, from their natural sagacity and woful expe-
rience, know the great truths of the gospel to be
unquestionably so, as they are there revealed. But
an assent, wrought in the soul from the reverent and
due regard of God's authority and veracity; yield-
ing firm belief to all that the scripture propoundeth,.
because of the testimony of that God, who can
neither deceive, nor be deceived ; such an assent
to truth, as prevails upon the conscience; and
influenceth the conversation ; a belief that is not
overborne by corrupt and vile affections, but con-
forms the life and practice, and makes them suit-
able to the rules of God's word.

This many, and that with a great deal of reason,
make to be the proper notion of a true and saving

124 THE DOCTRINE OF

faith. And the scripture doth so far affirm, that
such an assent as this is true faith ; that, in very
many places, it seems to require no more than
barely to believe those truths concerning God and
Christ, which are revealed in it; as, " that Jesus
is the Son of God ;" that he came into the world
to save sinners; 1 John iv. 15, and v. 5;
and that God raised him from the dead. Yet
these places must not be so understood, as if
nothing more were required to constitute a true
believer, besides a mere assent to these things ;
but that this assent is then true faith, when it over-
comes the will, seasons the affections, and regu-
lates our lives and actions. He hath true and
saving faith, who believes that Jesus Christ, the
Son of God and the true Messiah, is come into
the world, and submits his conscience and his
conversation to the consequences of such a belief;
that is to say, to love .and obey him as the Son of
God and the Saviour of the world. Now, the very
reason, why the scripture doth express faith by an
assent unto certain propositions, is, not that such
a dogmatical faith as rests only in notion and spe-
culation, will suffice to bring any to heaven and
happiness ; but because the Holy Ghost aimed
chiefly at that, which was least known and most
gainsayed by the Jews and the unbelieving world :
for it was not at all unknown or contradicted by
them, that, if Jesus Christ were the Son of God,
all adoration and obedience ought to be paid unto
him ; but they denied that Jesus was this Son of
God and the Saviour of the world. Therefore, the
scripture requires an assent unto these propositions
— that " Jesus is the Christ ;" that " he died for
our sins, and rose again from the dead ;" and calls
this true and saving faith, because, wheresoever

THE TWO COVENANTS. 125

this assent hath its due and proper effect, to engage
us to the performance of all those duties which
naturally depend upon it, and flow from it, there
this faith is undoubtedly justifying and saving.

(4.) Some make faith to consist in the hearty
and sincere acceptance of Christ Jesus, in his
person and offices, as he is represented and ten-
ders himself unto us in his gospel.

These offices of Christ are three.

[1.] He is our Prophet, to instruct us in the
will of God, and to declare unto us the way of
salvation.

[2.] He is our Priest, to expiate our sins, and
reconcile us unto God by the sacrifice of himself,
and to present our duties and services to God by
his prevailing and eternal intercession.

[3.] He is our King, to rule and govern us, by
the laws of his word, and by the conduct of his
Holy Spirit.

And whosoever he may be, that doth cordially and
entirely receive Christ in all these offices, and sub-
mit his soul to the authority of them, he is the
person, whose faith will justify him ; for he believes
to the saving of his soul.

Now, between this description of faith and the
former, there is no such difference, but that they
may very amicably conspire and be joined in one.
For he that gives a firm assent to all the truths of
the gospel, doth thereby own his subjection to the
prophetical office of Christ, as the great Teacher
of his church. And if this assent influence
both his affections and his conversation, it will
make him likewise submit to the priestly office
of Christ, in relying only upon his merits for the
pardon of his sins, and eternal salvation ; and also
to his kingly office, in submitting to his sceptre,
l2

126 THE DOCTRINE OF

and conforming his heart and life according to his.
holy laws.

Yet, to proceed a little more exactly in this
matter, let us observe, that when we speak of a
true, saving, and justifying faith, it is not any one
single act, either of knowledge or will ; but a
complicated grace, made up of many particular
acts, and is nothing else but the motion of the
whole soul towards God and Christ. For we are
not now speaking of faith, philosophically taken ;
for that is no other than a bare act of the under-
standing, assenting to the truth of a testimony :
but we speak of faith in a theological and moral
sense ; and so, though it bear the name but of one
grace, yet it consists of many acts of the soul. It
supposes knowledge ; it connotes assent ; it excites
love, and engages to obedience ; yet still, that
which gives it the formal denomination of faithr is
assent to the truth. As for assurance, I look upon
that, not as a distinct part of faith, but a high and
exalted degree and measure of it ; not vouchsafed
to all, scarcely to any at all times ; but only to some
few, through the special witness of the Holy Spirit
with their spirits.

So that, if we would at once see, in brief, what a
true and saving faith is, we may take the sum of
it in this description. It is when a sinner, being,
on the one hand, thoroughly convinced of his sins,
of the wrath of God due to him for them, of his
utter inability either to escape or bear this wrath ;
and, on the other hand, being likewise convinced
of the sufficiency, willingness, and designation of
Christ to satisfy justice, and to reconcile and save
sinners; doth hereupon yield a firm assent unto
these truths revealed in the scripture, and also
accepts and receives Jesus Christ in all his offices :

THE TWO COVENANTS. 127

as his Prophet, resolving to attend unto his teach-
ing ; as his Lord and King-, resolving to obey his
commands ; and as his Priest, resolving to rely
upon his sacrifice alone ; and doth accordingly
submit to him, and confide in him sincerely and
perseveringly. This is that faith which doth jus-
tify, and will certainly save all those in whom it
is wrought.

3. The next thing propounded, was to open the
nature of that obedience which the covenant of
grace requires as necessary to salvation.

This I shall do very briefly. And, therefore, I
take it for granted, that obedience is required
under the covenant of grace, as strictly as ever it
was under the covenant of works ; and required,
not only to show our gratitude and thankfulness,
but necessarily and indispensably, in order to the
obtaining of heaven and eternal life.

If I should quote to you all the scriptures which
are plain proofs for this, I should repeat a great
part of the bible. The moral law requires perfect
obedience from us, and condemns every failure as
sinful : and this moral law is still in force even to
believers themselves ; commanding and requiring
from them the highest degree of obedience, as ab-
solutely and authoritatively as if they were to be
saved by a covenant of works : for faith makes not
void the preceptive part of the law. But the
covenant of grace insists not so much on the mea-
sure and degree of our obedience, as on the quality
and nature of every degree, that it be sincere and
upright.

Yet, certainly, that is not sincere obedience,
which doth willingly and allowedly fall short of
the highest degree of perfection. For this sincerity
consists in a universal hatred of all sin, without

128 THE DOCTRINE OF

sparing or indulging ourselves in any ; and in a
universal regard to every command of God's law,
not dispensing with, nor exempting ourselves from
the most difficult, severe, and opposite duty to
flesh and blood, that is therein enjoined us.

He whose conscience can thus testify to him,
that, though he doth too often transgress and offend,
yet he ever hates what he sometimes doth; that he
abhors every false way; that he opposes and resists,
and is rather through the subtlety of Satan and the
deceitfulness of sin surprised unawares, than volun-
tarily and premeditately contrives and determines
to sin ; and, though he doth fall infinitely short of
the exact strictness and holiness of the law, yet
that he hath a cordial respect to all God's com-
mandments, and doth both desire and endeavour
to conform his life and conversation to that most
perfect rule ; that man may certainly know, that,
ret his obedience be more or less perfect, according
to the greater or less measures of sanctifying grace
received from God, yet it is such as the- covenant
of grace requires, and God will accept unto his
salvation. But, let no one take this for an en-
couragement of sloth and negligence in God's
service : for, let not that man think that his obe-
dience is sincere, who doth not, with unwearied
pains and industry, strive to his very utmost to
please and serve God in aH things. But for those
whose consciences bear them witness that they do
so, let them know, for their comfort, that, though
they fall far short of what they should and would
be, yet the sincerity of their obedience is accounted
and accepted with God for perfection.

When God first established the moral law, which
was when he first wrote it upon the heart of Adam,
he made it a covenant, that whosoever should

THE TWO COVENANTS. 129

answer the perfection of that law should obtain
life : but, by the fall we having lost the power of
obedience, the grace of the gospel promiseth ac-
ceptance to our imperfect obedience, if performed
sincerely. The law requires, as necessary to our
conformity to God's purity and holiness, that our
duties be perfect: the corruption of our nature
makes them imperfect and defective, both from
their rule and pattern. The covenant of grace
requires, as necessary to salvation, that that obe-
dience, which ought to be perfect according to the
rule, but is imperfect by reason of our corruption,
should be sincere and upright : and this, God will
accept and crown with eternal life and glory.

And thus I have opened to you, as briefly and
clearly as I could, what justification, faith, and
evangelical obedience are.

4. There remaineth but one thing more, which
"when I have finished, I shall close up this subject
of the doctrine of the covenants : and that is, to
show what influence faith and obedience have as to
our justification and salvation. And here,

(1.) I shall lay down these following positions.

[1.] That faith doth not justify us, as it is in
itself a work or act exerted by us.

It is true, the apostle tells us that Abraham's
faith " was imputed to him for righteousness,"
Rom. iv. 22 : but this cannot be understood
literally and properly, as if the very act of believ-
ing were his righteousness ; for then it would con-
tradict many other places of scripture, asserting
that Christ Jesus is our righteousness. It must
therefore be taken tropically,* as relating to Christ:
that is, faith is our righteousness no otherwise than

Rhetorically changed from the original meaning.

130 THE DOCTRINE OF

as it makes ov^r the righteousness of Christ unto
us; and not as it is in itself a work or grace. For,
did it justify us as a work, then the apostle had
very incongruously opposed him that " worketh,"
to him that u believeth :" " To him that worketh not,
but believeth — his faith is counted for righteous-
ness," Rom. iv. 5 : for were faith our righteous-
ness as a work, then he that believeth, would be
he that worketh; and his work would be accounted
to him for righteousness. Neither, indeed, is it
any whit less absurd, to think that our faith, which
is an imperfect grace, can yet be a perfect and
complete righteousness : for faith itself hath its
manifold failings, and is, as one saith well, like the
hand which Moses stretched out in working of
miracles ; for, as that hand was smitten with
leprosy, to show that it was no efficacy in the hand
itself that wrought those wonders, so even the faith
that justifies hath a leprosy, an uncleanness cleav-
ing to it, to show that it justifies not by its own
virtue, not as it is a work and act of ours, for so
itself needeth justification.

[2.] Neither doth faith justify, as it is the ful-
filling of the condition of the covenant of grace :
" He that believeth shall be saved."

For, as I have observed before, faith is not pro-
perly and immediately the condition of this cove-
nant, but remotely and secondarily. For we must
resolve this covenant thus : He that can produce
a perfect righteousness, shall be saved ; but he
that believes, shall have the perfect righteousness
of Christ made his : so, from the first to the last,
" He that believeth shall be saved." Where it is
to be noted, that faith is not made the immediate
condition of salvation; but only it is the immediate,
condition of obtaining an interest in a perfect

THE TWO COVENANTS. 131

righteousness, by which we are justified and
saved.

[3.] Faith justifying neither as a work nor as a
condition, and therefore not as being itself our
righteousness, it remains, that it must needs justify
as it gives us a right and title to the righteousness
of another, even of Jesus Christ.

So that we are not so properly justified by faith,
as by the righteousness which faith apprehends
and applies : for, the righteousness of Christ being
made ours, God is engaged in justice to justify us,
because then we aTe righteous persons. This virtue,
that faith hath to justify, is not its own ; neither
proceeds from itself, but from the object, which it
apprehends and makes ours, namely, the righteous-
ness of Christ, by which we are justified directly
and immediately, but by faith only correlatively
and metonymically,* as it relates unto the right-
eousness of Christ. "When the woman was healed
only by touching Christ's garments, the virtue
that healed her proceeded not from her touch, but
from Him whom she touched : yet our Saviour tells
her, that her faith had made her whole, Matt. ix. 22.
which can no more be properly understood of her
faith, than of her touch; for still the healing virtue
was from Christ, conveyed to her by her faith, and
that faith testified by her touch : so, when we say
that we are justified by faith, we must understand
that faith doth it not through its own virtue, but
by virtue of Christ's righteousness, which is con-
veyed to us by our faith. This righteousness of
Christ, as I observed before, is both a righteous-
ness of satisfaction and of obedience ; for we need
both unto our justification : and these must be

* A rhetorical figure, by which one word is put for
another.

132 THE DOCTRINE OF

made ours, or else we can never be justified by
them : ours they cannot be naturally, as wrought
out by ourselves ; consequently they must be ours
legally, and by imputation ; the law looking upon
what our Surety hath done, as though we had done
it, and accordingly dealing with us.

Now, if we can but apprehend how faith makes
the righteousness of Christ to be ours, it will be
very easy and obvious to apprehend the way and
manner how we are justified.

To clear up this, therefore,

[4.] Faith makes the righteousness of Christ's
satisfaction and obedience to be ours, as it is the
bond of that mystical union which there is between
Christ and the believing soul.

If Christ and the believer be one, the righteous-
ness of Christ may well be reckoned as the right-
eousness of the believer. Nay, mutual imputation
flows from mystical union : the sins of believers are
imputed to Christ, and the righteousness of Christ
to them ; and both justly, because being united
each to other by mutual consent (which consent on
our part is faith) God considers them but as one
person. As it is in marriage — the husband stands
liable to the wife's debts, and the wife stands
interested in the husband's possessions ; so it is
here : faith is the marriage-band and tie between
Christ and a believer; and, therefore, all the debts
of a believer are chargeable upon Christ, and the
righteousness of Christ is instated upon the believer:
so that, upon the account of this marriage-union,
he hath a legal right and title to the purchase made
by it. Indeed, this union is a high and inscrutable
mystery ; yet plain it is, that there is such close,
spiritual, and real union between Christ and a
believer : the scripture often both expressly affirms

THE TWO COVENANTS. 133

it, " He that is joined unto the Lord is one
spirit," 1 Cor. vi. 17. and also lively illustrates it
by several resemblances. It is likewise plain, that
the band of this union, on the believer's part, is
faith: consult Rom. xi. 17. compared with the
20th verse. And, therefore, from the nearness
of this union, there follows a communication
of interests and concerns : insomuch, that the
church is called Christ, " So also is Christ," 1 Cor.
xii. 12. and their sufferings are called the sufferings
of Christ, Col. i. 24. Acts ix. 4. So, likewise, from
this mystical union, the sins of believers are laid
upon Christ, and his righteousness imputed unto
them : see this as to both parts, " He hath made him
to be sin for us, who knew no sin ; that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him," 2 Cor.
v. 21. and, He " hath redeemed us from the curse
of the law, being made a curse for us — that the
blessing of Abraham might come on us," Gal. iii.
13. 14. It is still upon the account of this union,
that Christ was reckoned a sinner, and we are
reckoned as righteous. And, therefore, as faith is
the bond and tie of this union, so it is, without
more difficulty, the way and means of our justifi-
cation: by faith, we are united unto Christ ; by
that union, we have truly a righteousness ; and,
upon that righteousness, the justice of God, as well
as his mercy, is engaged to justify and acquit us.

And thus you see this great truth explained, of
justification by faith; which hath, indeed, been as
great a torment and vexation to men's understand-
ings to conceive how it should be, as it hath been
peace and quiet to their consciences in the certainty
it was so. And, if these things were duly pondered,
they might perhaps put a speedy issue to many
laborious and testy disputes ; especially concerning

134 THE DOCTRINE OF

faith's instrumentality and causality in our justifi-
cation.

(2.) Concerning obedience, or good works, two
things remain to be inquired into.

Their necessity and influence into salvation, or
our obtaining the state of eternal glory.

Their necessity and influence into justification,
which gives us a right and title to that eternal
glory.

[1.] The covenant of grace requires good works
of believers, as necessary to salvation.

There is a lazy and lethargic error, that hath
seized on many, who make Christ not only their
Surety to work out a righteousness, but also their
servant to work out an obedience and holiness for
them. What need they pray, or hear, or perform
any other duty of religion or obedience ; for Christ
hath done ail for them, and, if they believe, they are
sure of being accepted and saved? and, therefore,"
they count it the sign of a legal spirit, to do any
more than idly sit down, and believe; expecting
to be carried to heaven in such a vain dream and
contemplation. Here,

It is true, that obedience is not necessary as
the procuring or meritorious cause of our salvation.

In respect of merit, we are to sit down and be-
lieve; and those good works are saucy and sacri-
legious, that aim at heaven upon the account of
desert, " By grace are ye saved, not of works,"
Eph. ii. 8, 9. Indeed the scripture doth frequently
call salvation by the name of a reward : " Of the
Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance,"
Col. iii. 24. " He had respect unto the recom-
pence of the reward," Heb. xi. 26. And it doth
as frequently call the obedient worthy of this re-
ward: " they which shall be accounted worthy to

THE TWO COVENANTS. 135

obtain" the " world" to come. " and the resurrec-
tion from the dead," Luke xx. 35. " That ye may
be counted worthy of the kingdom of God," 2 Thess.
i. 5. Yet neither of these expressions doth amount
to a proper merit, such as commutative justice
may require, where the price must fully answer the
value of the thing purchased ; but only such a me-
rit and worthiness, as ariseth from the free promise
of God. God hath promised salvation to those
who obey him ; and, therefore, because of this pro-
mise, it is bestowed upon them as a reward of their
obedience : and they are said to be worthy of such
a reward, not because their obedience is in itself
worthy of it; but, rather, beeause it is worthy of
God to stand to bis word, and to fulfil the promises
he hath made.

Further : Good works are necessary to eternal
salvation, though not as the meritorious cause of
the reward, yet as the disposing cause of the sub-
ject; for these are they which do dispose and pre-
pare us for salvation.

And therefore the apostle, Col. i. 12. speaks of
being made " meet to be partakers of the inherit-
ance" with "the saints in light." If a wicked per-
son should be made partaker of this inheritance,
how strange, how vexatious a thing would it be to
him, to spend an eternity there in holiness, who
had here spent all his time in sin and wickedness!
And, therefore, God accustoms those whom he
saves by ordinary means, unto the work of heaven,
while they are here on earth. Let those consider
this, to whom holiness is so irksome and unsuitable
now : it is utterly impossible, that such men can
be made happy and blessed ; for, if God should take
them up to heaven with their natures unchanged,
unrenewed, he would only free them from a painful

136 THE DOCTRINE OF

hell, to sentence them to a troublesome one. How
shall they sing the song of the Lamb, who never
had their hearts and voices tuned unto it! Or how
shall they endure to behold the glorious majesty
of God face to face, who never before saw him so
much as darkly through a glass by the eye of faith!
It is a perfect torture, for eyes, locked up in a long
and dismal darkness, to be suddenly stretched open
against the bright beams of the sun : and so would
it be, if men, who have long lived in a blind and
wicked state, should suddenly be stricken with the
dazzling glory of heaven flashing in their faces. And
therefore God usually prepares them, both to do
the work and to bear the reward of heaven before
he brings them thither. It is said of the godly,
Rev. xiv. 13. that they " rest from their labours,
and their works do follow them :" this is especially
meant, I doubt not, of the reward of their works :
but yet it holds true also of the works themselves :
though, in heaven, they rest from their labour in
working — in working against temptations, against
corruptions, and under afflictions — yet they rest not
from their working, for those very works, in which
they employed themselves on earth, they also per-
form in heaven, so far forth as they have there an
object for them. Were it, therefore, only to dis-
pose and qualify the soul for the everlasting work
of heaven, this were reason and ground enough to
require obedience and good works as necessary to
salvation.

Again, I need not tell you, that good works are ne-
cessary, upon the absolute and sovereign command
of God. . -

If God should command good works for no other
end, but to show the authority which he hath over
us, and for us to show our obedience again unto

THE TWO COVENANTS. 137

him, yet that, cannot be any longer an unnecessary
thing which the great God of heaven and earth en-
joins. " This is the will of God;" that is, this is
the great command of his revealed will, " even your
sanctification," 1 Thess. iv. 3. And we are said to be
the " workmanship" of God, " created unto good
works, which God hath before ordained that we
should walk in them," Eph. ii. 10.

Further : They are necessary, as a debt of gra-
titude.

If we had no other law, yet christian ingenuous-
ness would oblige us to obey that God, who hatli
already done so much for us, and from whom we
expect such great things for the future. Hath God
given us a spiritual life in present possession, and
an eternal life in reversion ; and is it possible we
should be careless of his honour and service? Cer-
tainly, the love of Christ must constrain us to live
no longer to ourselves, but to him, who died for us :
as the apostle urgeth it, 2 Cor. v. 14, 15. It is such
a powerful and persuasive motive, that we cannot
resist it, without the blackest brand of disingenu-
ousness and ingratitude. Thus, again, the apostle
argueth : " Ye are bought with a price ; therefore
glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which
are God's," 1 Cor. vi. 20. So that, upon the account
of our redemption, we are obliged, by the strictest
and most sacred bonds of gratitude, to serve an-d
glorify our Redeemer. Yet, though this be the
sweetest, it is not the only tie to duty. It will, in-
deed, be so when we come to heaven; but, whilst
we have the mixture of a base and sordid spirit,
God hath not left his service to stand at the courtesy
of our ingenuity; but hath laid as absolute and
peremptory commands upon us, as though he dealt
only with slavesand vassals; and yet urgeth it as much
m 2

138 THE DOCTRINE OF

upon our gratitude and ingenuousness, as if the
only prerogative he had over us, were but love
and friendship.

Finally : Obedience and good works are neces-
sary, as the way and means whereby we must
obtain salvation.

And so, though they have no necessity of causa-
lity in procuring it by their own merit, yet they have
a necessity of order or method, according to which
God will bestow it, and not otherwise. And there-
fore the apostle tells us, that God hath " fore-or-
dained" good works, " that we should walk in them."
They are the pathway, that he hath chalked out for
us to heaven; and, therefore, as ever we will arrive
thither, it is necessary that we walk in this way.
Yea, should it be supposed that an elect or a rege-
nerate person should forsake this way of obedience,
and betake himself unto the broad way wherein the
most walk, we affirm that he is going the direct and
ready road to hell; and hell he cannot escape,
unless he stop and return. Let their mouths, there-
fore, be for ever silenced, who exclaim against the
doctrine of justification and salvation by faith, as
that which destroys the necessity of good works.
We are far from that libertinism to conclude, that,
because Christ hath obeyed the whole law for us,
therefore we are exempted from obedience. He hath
done for us whatsoever was required, in order to
merit and satisfaction ; yet he hath not done for us
whatever was required, in order to obedience and a
holy conversation : that is, Christ hath done his own
work for us ; but he hath not done our work for us :
he hath done the work of a Mediator and Redeemer;
but he never did the work of a sinner that stood
in need of a Redeemer, so as to excuse him from
it. And, therefore, though men may be justified by

THE TWO COVENANTS. 139

a surety, yet they cannot be sanctified by a surety ;
but still, holiness, obedience, and good works must
be personal, and not imputative.

Thus then you see the absolute necessity of good
works, in those who are capable of performing them,
in order unto eternal salvation. They are neces-
sary, not indeed as the meritorious cause of it, but
as a preparing and disposing cause; necessary, by
God's absolute and indispensable command ; as a
debt of gratitude; and, lastly, as the way and
means by which alone it can be attained. Thus the
apostle, Heb. v. 9, Christ is become " the author
of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him."

[2.] The next thing to be inquired into is, the
necessity and influence of obedience and good
works into our justification.

And, in order to this, I shall lay down these fol-
lowing particulars.

1 . Good works, or obedience, doth not justify us
in the sight of God, as it is itself our righteousness.

This is the main scope and drift of the whole
epistle to the Romans, and of a great part of the
epistle to the Galatians. It were endless to cite all
the texts: see only Rom. iii. 20. " By the deeds
of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his
sight:'* and ver. 28. the apostle lays down this great
conclusion as the upshot of his dispute, " There-
fore we conclude," saith he, " that a man is justi-
fied— without the deeds of the law;" and, Gal. ii. 16.
" Knowing that a man is not justified by the works
of the law." It is needless to add more.

And, therefore, I shall only answer an objection
or two, drawn from scripture, against this doctrine.
For,

(1.) Some may say that the scripture seems to
attribute justification unto works, as well as unto

T40 THE DOCTRINE OF

faith: for it is said of Phinehas, Psa. cvi. 30, 31.
that he " executed judgment" (namely in killing
Zimri and Cosbi) " and that was" imputed " unto
him for righteousness."

But to this the answer is easy : that the psalmist
speaks only of the righteousness of that particular
act of Phinehas, that it was imputed to him for right-
eousness, that is, it was accounted by God as a
righteous deed; though, .perhaps, others might cen-
sure it, as proceeding from rash and unwarrantable
zeal, acting without a commission. But,

(2.) The great place, most urged and insisted
On for justification by works, is James, chap. ii.
from the 14th verse to the end; especially ver. 24.
**■ Ye see then how that by works a man is justi-
fied, and not by faith only."

Here the grand difficulty is, how we shall recon-
cile St. Paul, asserting that we are justified by
faith only without works, with St James, affirming
we are justified by works, and not by faith only.

To this I answer : that there is no opposition at
all between the two apostles. For St. Paul only
excludes works from being the way and means of
our justification ; and St. James only excludes that
faith which is without works. St. Paul disputes
against legalists and self-justiciaries, who trusted
to their own works to justify them ; and, against
them, he lays down this conclusion, that it is faith,
and not works, that doth justify: but St. James
disputes against the gnostics and libertines, who
trusted to an outward and fruitless profession of
faith, or rather indeed to a vain fancy instead of
faith; and, against them, he lays down this con-
clusion, that not by faith only, but by works, a
man is justified. St. Paul's scope is, to show by
what we are justified ; and that, he tells us, is by

THE TWO COVENANTS. 141

faith : St. James's scope is to show what kind of
faith that is, which must justify us; not an empty,
vain, fantastical faith, but such as is operative, and
productive of good works: his intent is not, to
exclude faith from our justification, no, nor so much
as to join works with it in partnership and commis-
sion; for, ver. 23, he tells us, " the scripture was
fulfilled, which saith, Abraham believed God, and
it was imputed unto him for righteousness;" the
very place, which St. Paul (Rom. iv. 3. Gal. iii. 6.)
makes use of to prove justification by faith : and,
therefore, when he saith a man is justified by works,
he contends for nothing else but a working faith :
Abraham, saith he, was " j ustified by works," ver. 2 1 .
if you ask how that doth appear, he tells you it was
because his faith " was imputed unto him for right-
eousness:" now, let any man declare, that can,
what sense there can be in this proof, if, by being
justified by faith, he should mean any thing else
besides a working faith. So that the upshot of all
that St. James here intends, is, to show us, that
the faith which justifies us, must be a faith bring-
ing forth good works ; and that we grant and con-
tend for : and, likewise, to exclude a barren specu-
lative faith, which is not accompanied with good
works ; to exclude it, I say, from having any in-
fluence as to our justification. So, in the 14th ver.
" What doth it profit — though a man say he hath
faith, and have not works? Can faith save him?"
that is, Can such a faith as hath no works save him?
This faith he calls a " dead" faith, ver. 17; the
faith of " devils," ver. 19 ; and the faith of a
" vain man," ver. 20 : now, a dead faith, a faith
that may be in devils and vain men, is no true faith,
nor can any affirm that it will justify. Thus you
see St. Paul and St. James fully accorded, about this

142 THE DOCTRINE OF

doctrine of justification by faith. St. Paul affirms,
that it is faith alone that justifies ; St. James denies,
that a lonely faith can justify : and we assent to
both as true ; for the faith, which alone justifies us
is not a lonely or solitary faith, but accompanied
and attended by good works.

That is the first particular. Good works are not
the righteousness by which we are justified.

2. Though we are not justified by works, yet
good works are necessary to our justification, so
that we cannot possibly be justified without them.

There must, at least, be those inward good
works of sorrow for sin, hatred of it, true repent-
ance and humiliation, hope in the pardoning mercy
of God through Jesus Christ. Yea, faith itself
must be in the soul as it is a good work, before it
can justify: this is evident; for if faith j ustify, and
a justifying faith be a good work (though it doth
not justify as it is so) then some good work is ab-
solutely necessary to justification. Yea,

3. Good works are absolutely necessary, to
preserve the state of justification when once ob-
tained.

It is impossible that we should maintain our
justification, without believing, repenting, mortify-
ing the deeds of the body, and performing the
duties of new obedience ; all which are good
works : and the reason is, because, as soon as
these cease, their contraries, which are utterly in-
consistent with a justified estate, succeed in the
room of them.. If faith, repentance, and mortifi-
cation cease, it is impossible that justification can
be preserved : otherwise, a man might be a justi-
fied unbeliever, a justified impenitent, a justified
slave to his lusts ; which is a contradiction. You
see then that good works are necessary, both for

THE TWO COVENANTS. 143

the first obtaining of justification, and for the pre-
servation of it when obtained. Hence, then,

4. We may easily determine that much debated
question — Whether good works be required in the
covenant of grace as a condition of justification.

For if, by a condition of justification, we nega-
tively understand that, without which we cannot
be justified, then certain it is, that, in this sense,
good works are a condition of it. But, if we take
condition positively, for that whereby we are justi-
fied ; so, not works, but a working faith is the con-
dition. We are not justified by works, neither can
we be justified without them. And, therefore,
when the apostle tells us, that we are "justified by
faith without the deeds of the law," Rom. iii. 28.
this must not be understood without the presence
of works, for that I have shown you is necessarily
required, but without their causality and influence
into our justification. Conditions we may call
them, in a large sense, because they are indispensa-
bly required in the person justified ; but they are,
in no wise, causes or means of our justification.

So that you see the doctrine of justification by
faith is no patronage for looseness and libertinism.
Good works are now as necessary under the cove-
nant of grace, as ever they were under the covenant
of works ; but only to other ends and purposes.
The covenant of works required them, that we
might be justified by them ; but the covenant of
grace requires them, that we might be justified by
faith. Let none think, that the covenant of grace
gives any dispensation from working ; or that an
airy and speculative faith, and a barren and empty
profession, are enough to answer the terms of this
covenant : " Can faith save him ?" and yet what
other is the faith of many professors ? Should I

144 THE TWO COVENANTS.

bid them show me their faith by their works, I
much doubt, that, besides phrases and canting, we
should have but very slender evidences of their
Christianity ; and yet these men are very apt to
condemn others for carnal legalists, and low
attainers. But let such notion ists flatter them-
selves as they please ; yet, certainly, they will find
such low attainers, who work out their salvation
with fear and trembling, more exalted saints in
glory, than those who think both working, fear,
and trembling too slavish and servile, and below
the free spirit of the gospel.

" Now the God of peace, that brought again
from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ, that great
Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the
everlasting covenant, make you perfect — to do his
will, working in you that which is well-pleasing in
his sight, through Jesus Christ : to whom be glory
for ever and ever." Amen.

THE END.

Loudon: il. Fisher, it. Fisher, & P. Jackson, Printers.